


My head on the hood of your car

by glovered



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Notting Hill Fusion, Angst and Humor, Dubious Consent, Horror, M/M, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-22
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-23 22:08:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8344612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glovered/pseuds/glovered
Summary: Dean has been dead for two years, and Sam's life has ground to a halt in Detroit. Or is it just beginning? Sam has friends, a job, and a new lease on life. So it seems only fitting that a strange sort of hell wearing his brother's face would find him there.





	

_Man found dead in dumpster, eyes removed; second body this week!_

It's a newspaper headline that would have been grounds for a hunt. Sam and Dean used to throw their duffel bags in the car and drive across the country for less.

Today, it still catches Sam's eye.

But he doesn't tear out the article or make a note. He doesn't do that stuff anymore. He folds the paper instead and slides it back in the rack with the others, where it will stay until one of the bookshop's few customers buys it.

"I'm going to grab us a couple coffees," his boss and only co-worker Carl tells him.

Sam nods from where he's organizing the counter display. "Black, no sugar."

Carl pats him on the shoulder as he passes. "I know. So emo, Winchester."

The bell tinkles over the shop door as he leaves. And when the door swings open again a minute later, Sam looks up and freezes in place.

The customer, a man in his thirties, offers a greeting, but Sam barely notices past the headrush he gets at the vision of Dean. Familiar gait, navy-colored jacket, a shade of stubble.

The man who just entered the bookshop is not Dean, of course. He's just anyone. Generic. He's Dean's height, a similar build, but otherwise he's completely unremarkable. Sam sees this belatedly, after his heart has already started beating wildly in his chest.

It's not Dean. This makes sense, he reminds himself. Because Dean's dead. He died two years ago and there's no way Sam can make that untrue.

While the customer clocks five whole minutes considering which spellcraft manual to buy, Sam swallows past the nausea that's fought its way up his throat.

He smiles tightly when the guy brings a brightly colored photo book to the counter. "This legit?"

Sam flips the book over. "'True sightings of the paranormal,'" he reads out. "Sounds legit to me."

"Great. And I'll take one of these, too." He pulls today's paper from the rack.

Sam scans the book and paper, and puts them in a bag for him.

"Long day?" the man asks.

Sam nods. "Something like that. Fifteen ninety-nine, please. Sign here."

The guy is left handed, Sam notices, not right. He also slides the receipt smoothly into his wallet when Sam hands it back instead of crumpling it into a ball. He's nothing like Dean.

"Have a good one," Sam tells him, and watches him leave.

Twenty-four months out, and Sam still sees his brother everywhere. 

 

 

 

Sam lives in one of the many shitty apartments in a quiet neighborhood in Detroit. It's an up and coming area, or so he's been told.

He hadn't meant to settle anywhere near Michigan, hadn't planned to settle at all, really. His plan had been to call on every powerful entity he knew until he got Dean back from the dead or died trying. Most likely the latter.

But the trail ran out in Detroit, after he'd managed to summon Billie the reaper one last time. She'd never been a fan of the Winchesters, she'd made that clear the moment she met them, and this interaction went no different.

"It's over now," she told him. "God saved the earth. The sun didn't die out. You should live your life while you still have breath in your body."

"If the world still exists, it means my brother might still be out there."

For a second, Billie almost looked kind. "Your brother sacrificed himself to save humanity, Sam. You of all people should understand. He's not coming back."

Sam's week long hotel stay turned into three. He didn't know where to turn. And when his last fake card maxed out a month later, his two-dollar coffee order rejected, Sam considered his choices with despair on the cold sidewalk. He ended up ducking into Detroit's number one occult bookstore to think, and when he grabbed a book on the afterlife off the top shelf, Carl had offered him a job on the spot.

"I'm normal-person size," he explained, peering at Sam through his thick-rimmed glasses. "I've been on the lookout for a giant like yourself to help me stock the top shelves. So, whaddaya say?"

The only personal question Carl asked Sam was whether he was more a sandwich or Chinese food type of fellow, because there was a good place for either on this street.

"Both," Sam told him.

"Good," said Carl. "You can start tomorrow."

Now, Sam folds his Friday check up in his pocket and walks back from work, a year and a half since becoming reasonably employed by accident, a year and a half of paying rent on time, still finding ghosts of Dean places he least expects to, shades of his brother Sam can't help but see in every corner of the world.

It's early evening, the chill of late November. Two guys pass on bikes, jumping broken curbs. An elderly woman says encouraging things to her small dog as it drags on the leash. It's frigid in Detroit this time of year and Sam thinks he might feel a few stray drops of rain his neck, so he speeds up his pace. He keeps his head down.

He comes into sight of his crumbling building not long after, and rummages in his pocket for the key ring with two keys on it.

When he reaches his stoop, he jiggles the one belonging to his apartment in the lock for a good half a minute, breath coming out in harsh puffs of air. Sometimes he ends up picking the lock instead — it's honestly faster than trying to jimmy the key into a respectable position.

Just as he begins considering the rusty nail jutting from the door frame as a useful tool in this endeavor, the lock snicks open and he forces the door in with his shoulder, pushing inside out of the cold. 

His roommate isn't home. It's immediately clear from the lack of naked ass on the couch. This means the TV's free, and Sam rolls his eyes when he catches himself getting excited about the prospect of passing out to the weather channel for the fourth night in the row. He briefly imagines what the Sam of twenty-sixteen would think of him now.

He's putting his weather channel plan into action, boots still on and remote in hand, when there's a loud bang at the door.

It's sharp like a screen door in a hurricane, and he stops stock still listening to it, knowing there's no one alive to run from anymore. God and Amara have officially left the building, Crowley and Rowena are in the wind, but Sam is cautious anyway.

Ray's face is casual when Sam finally yanks the door open, like he hadn't just been banging the place down. Sam feels warm at the sight of him.

He crosses his arms over his chest. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, you know." Ray leans against the doorframe. "I was in the area."

"Right. This is a convenient stop on your commute." Ray doesn't work anywhere close to Sam's apartment.

Ray only smiles. "So, good day peddling witchcraft to minors?"

Sam doesn't close the door in his face.

"The Crypt is a respectable establishment, thank you very much," he says, and when Ray laughs, Sam continues, "But now that you mention it, we _do_ carry goth porn mags, and there are a suspicious number of teenagers hanging out in that corner of the store during school hours."

"You're a public menace," Ray informs him.

"Yeah, me and the yogurt place down the street. Those hoodlums hang around there, too."

An ominous creaking comes from upstairs and Ray looks at the ceiling like it might cave in. "Have I mentioned that where you live is reprehensible?"

"Once or twice."

The place is old, it's true. The paint is chipped and the freezer never quite freezes anything. The front door is impossible and one of the cabinets is missing a hinge. The rug is questionable. 

But Sam fixed the heater after he moved in. Aside from winning him the dubious honor of being in his weird roommate's good graces, it made the place warm in the quickly icy winter months, cozy even. His place might objectively suck, but the open cupboard is stacked with soup cans and ramen packets, and Sam has made a home where he lines his shoes up every night. 

"Not to mention it's super far from my place," Ray points out.

Sam gives him a look, "And you were just in the area."

Ray shrugs and crooks a smile.

They've been doing this thing. They'd met at the liquor store by the whiskey section, and things had continued in that fashion. 

Whatever it is, it's not like last time. Not like Amelia, whose life had collided with Sam's mid-tail spin. This time, Sam has all but made his peace with Dean's death. He's learning to live again, not just survive. Ray is smart and quietly funny, and nice above all other things. He shows up again and again with what Sam can only describe as pure tenacity given the way Sam doesn't give back as much as he probably should.

"I thought I'd just drop in with some takeout," Ray says, hoisting a plastic bag full of stacked cartons. "Maybe invite a couple people. Drinks, movie, what have you."

"Maybe..."

"Come on, Sam."

"You already called everyone, didn't you?" 

"Exacto."

Sam sighs and steps aside. 

"Oh good," Ray nods to the TV. "Looks like you were down to watch something anyway. Hey, you got any beer?"

Sam goes to grab them a couple from the fridge.

And by the time Jack and Lily and Tara show up, Ray's managed to pull a smile out of Sam despite his ruined plans of passing out until work tomorrow, only to drag through daylight and then sleep again. 

"There you go," Tara says when Sam opens the door, depositing a six-pack against his chest like an entry fee. "Oh good, Thai food."

Sam busies himself in the kitchen, grabbing extra napkins and some waters. The sink sprays a little when he turns it on, and he makes a note to look into that later. 

Jack, an accountant who hates his job more than other accountants Sam has met, toasts from where he's already taken Sam's spot on the couch. "Guys, you're never going to believe it. But I got to date number three!"

Lily shakes her head at Sam, then calls. "Nice. Well, I got dumped. Thanks for reminding me."

"No! Not Snaggletooth Nick!"

Lily sighs, "Come on. It was just the one tooth."

"At least two," Sam says.

"You know what?" She brandishes the first thing she can get her hands on — one of Sam's roommate's naked-lady ladles — and tries to look threatening. She's small but very fierce.

"I'm afraid," Sam says. "Hold me."

Tara calls over to them, "Hey guys, are we going to watch this movie or what?"

"Depends on what we're watching."

"Murder in Manhattan." Lily slips the disc into Sam's thrift-store DVD player. "Critics have nothing but good things to say about it. They think it might be up for Best Actor this year."

Jack groans.

"I lost a coin toss," Ray tells him. "I'm sorry, man." He settles next to Sam on the floor. Not too close, but close enough that Sam feels antsy. 

"Sam, you gonna back me up on this?" Jack says.

"Yeah, rom-coms aren't really my style. But she won the coin toss, so fair's fair."

The DVD menu appears, featuring sappy music and rose petals that rain down around a sparkly heart.

"You're dead to me," Jack tells Ray over the soft lilting of violins.

Tara tosses a pillow in their general direction. "Shh."

"Dude, I thought you said you'd seen it already."

"Three times," Tara says. "Shut up, I promise it's good."

Ray nudges Sam and laughs, low in his ear. He passes over a carton and Sam digs into hot noodles. His apartment has been invaded by friends and it's not the first time.

The movie begins with a girl in a frilly dress walking home alone at night, the music creepy. The camera catches the look of fear in her eyes when she hears a snap of a twig behind her.

But it's only the love interest. It's obvious from the broad width of his shoulders and his romantic silhouette as he steps out of the shadows to catch her when she trips on a cobblestone.

"My darling, please be careful," he says, steadying her.

When the man tips his hat up to reveal his face, Sam gasps out loud.

He knows the shape of that nose, those freckles and long lashes. 

Dean-as-fifties-love-interest bends at the waist to lay a gentle kiss on the woman's gloved hand, and when he stands straight again, it's the same clever smile that Sam sees in his dreams each night.

Dean. Not some fake, or poor facsimile. It's really him.

The movie goes on in a similar fashion. The girl tells her friends about the dashing man she met. Meanwhile, there's a suspicious murder, that Dean is of course the cause of. It is ridiculous. It is surreal. Sam is cemented to the couch, blinking through shock at what should be impossible. He's unable to move his hand from his knee, his feet stuck to the floor boards. 

"Chick flick," Ray mutters so only Sam can hear, but Sam can't respond, transfixed by the sight of Dean in HD.

"What is going on?" he mutters.

Someone bats at Sam with a pillow and says, "Shut up, it gets good."

 

Sam gulps as Dean's mouth draws up into an angelic smirk one moment and a perfect moue the next. The faces around him of the people he's known for over a year now look like the faces of strangers, the world misaligning with his past life.

"When did this movie come out?" Sam asks the room.

"A few months ago."

"Who's that actor?" He thinks his voice might slur a little at the end, he feels very far away from his body.

"He's this new hot star. Dean Smith. I'm surprised you haven't heard of him."

The only spot of light he can see right now is Dean. A moving picture, a ghost. He has a horrible suspicion that this normal, well-adjusted life of his is all a dream, that he's been on the other side of a djinn for some time and Dean's been trying to break through to him in any way he can.

Sam watches the camera pan across Dean's face, a perfect expression of regret twisting up Dean's mouth as he says, "Marriage? But what would your mother think of me? I'm just a poor soldier from Carolina."

Sam feels like he's sinking under. He's had his one brush with sanity before he's dunked under, maybe never to return. 

 

 

 

Dean, alive.

He has no one to call, no one to ask how Dean could possibly be found on film. That first year after the sun didn't go out and the world didn't end, he'd prayed, wailed, and begged the heavens to bring his brother back. But to no response. Cas has been no help. The only reaper he knows would rather see him dead. He has no one to turn to now. 

But he has himself, and one of his most charming qualities is his ability to be stubborn in the face of great impossibility. Sam counts the tick-tick of the minute hand on the wall clock, and stares the dark ceiling down until sunlight pinks the rooftops across the street.

Morning.

At which point he rolls off his bed in one, fluid movement. It feels as though his limbs are losing their years of stiffness, his mind has become alert even though he barely closed his eyes all night.

With a sense of deep foreboding he pulls on his shirt and laces his shoes. He eats breakfast mechanically, to keep up his strength rather than because he feels at all hungry.

Dean died two years ago. Of all the facts in life, Sam is certain of this one. But it's less than twelve hours since Sam saw his brother's face on screen, apparently alive and well. The numbers don't come out right even now that he's trying to add it all up in daylight. Above all things, this is what he needs to find out, before he rushes in headfirst and hunts Dean down in Hollywood or something equally impulsive. 

After breakfast he turns to his old friend: research.

Searchtheweb dot com yields nothing on Dean Winchester, but—on a hunch—it does return hundreds of results on actor Dean Smith.

The headlines are scandalous, the pictures the kind that would make Dean leer approvingly. At the very least, that thought is comforting. Sam is distantly horrified as he scrolls through image after image of Dean clad in tight jeans — model-tight — and sometimes in cowboy boots. That smirk is playing across Dean's mouth in every one.

Sam lingers over a photo of Dean in a wet button-down, water running so sensually down his face Sam can imagine reaching out to feel the droplets. As he drinks his coffee, Sam watches the underwear commercial that Dean shot just this July, where Dean does a little dance in soft-looking grey boxer briefs that leave nothing to the imagination.

Sam drags his eyes away from the video with difficulty to click Dean Smith's IMDB page.

_Date of Birth: unknown. This now-Hollywood babe rocketed to stardom out of literal nowhere after he was scouted at a club in West Hollywood, purportedly enjoying a glass of his signature whiskey. Details of Smith's pre-actor life is unknown, but it is confirmed that he once worked in the pest control business. He's known to enjoy barbecue, and refers to himself as "your all-around-American guy." Smith is openly bisexual and has been spotted out on the town with numerous up-and-comers, and many seasoned celebrities as well._

The bio is clearly fake, put together through rumor and speculation. It gives Sam nothing.

The possibility that this might not be his real reality occurs to him again, but he can't start thinking like that or he might go crazy. No, unfortunately it's more likely Dean's sudden appearance is part of an elaborate plot by some big bad, meant to draw Sam out and kill off the last of the Winchesters once and for all.

But that plan is a little big-headed, even despite past experience, and Sam can't think of anyone in particular currently out for his head. He and Dean have both left the playing field, names forgotten.

Sam clicks through the links, noting the three movies Dean has in post-production, all of the romantic comedy variety, and one currently is shooting on-location somewhere. The pictures are endless, Dean at movie premieres, award shows. 

Sam touches his screen distractedly, zooms on the blankness of Dean's smile, his perfect teeth. If the fact that Dean would never come back from the grave just to be an actor doesn't convince Sam that something is epically wrong with this situation, then the bow ties in those pictures really drive a stake into the coffin.

Sam returns to the bio, and rubs a hand over his face. "Who are you?"

Because it's not Dean. That would be impossible. Sam had his initial shock, but he has to come to terms with the facts. This is Dean's body, yes, but it's another fake. Be it shifter, topa, or some other phantom Sam hasn't met yet, it's not his brother.

Sam sits there in front of his computer for a long while, then closes his computer. "Shit."

He rubs his eyes, trying to think, then jumps up when his alarm goes off, breaking the reverie. "Shit!"

He shoves his feet in his shoes and grabs his phone and keys. He sprints to work.

 

 

 

Sam never went back to the bunker.

It was a place he called home, for a time, and he remembers it sometimes with vague fondness. The kitchen was a strange metal room where Sam usually got stuck on dishes duty after Dean made him dinner. The hall of bedrooms was where he spent a hundred dreamless nights, and where some of his best friends came to stay and then leave. That library, that meticulous labor of love, puts every other library in the contiguous United States to shame.

All those things, though, they were just perks of the situation. The trappings of a settled life. After Dean sacrificed himself, Sam couldn't face returning. He had what he needed, the clothes on his back and a duffel in the trunk. His wallet and his laptop and the necessary information of his life backed up in his email. 

He never went back, instead just moved forward. He'd cleared out the impala and locked her up in a storage space in Kansas that cost too much a month, and he'd hotwired a real junker that had been abandoned roadside. He'd spent his life learning to pick up and leave at a moment's notice, and he was good at it.

Things were transient for a while there, back to the way things had been before he and Dean's semi-permanent home, only sans one brother. 

Then, Detroit.

In light of the current situation, Sam is thinking maybe it's past time he headed back to Kansas. He needs the bunker's horde of knowledge, needs to get back in the game if he's going to find out what the hell is going on.

"—which is when my husband comes by the office for lunch and you know know what he tells me?" Sam's brought out of his thoughts by an elderly customer's pause as she waits for an answer. 

A headshake is enough of a contribution to the long anecdote, and the old lady continues recounting this story to Sam. Sam surreptitiously checks his watch.

"He tells me I have my glasses on top of my head." She wheezes a laugh. "On top of my head, the whole time. Can you imagine?"

Sam shakes his head. "No, ma'am. Can't imagine."

"It was a hoot. You have a nice day."

"You too," Sam mumbles belatedly, five seconds after the shop door's already swung closed, cutting off the hum of traffic.

He glances around the store. Two teenagers are huddled by the magazines, deep in conversation, and the only other customer is a man who must have come in when the old lady left, browsing the cheesy spell manuals. The back of his head through the stacks reminds Sam of the back of Dean's head, and Sam reminds himself to stop trying to find things that aren't there, and looks down at his computer screen. He can't keep doing this. He has to find the thing that's masquerading as his brother.

He takes a closer look at the article on Dean Smith, the imposter, that he's currently mining for details. It's a gossip piece on a bright teen entertainment site, but it might be the key to everything. 

He scrolls down past the pictures and quotes and— Bingo. It looks like Dean is currently filming in the midwest, or so sources have said. Good, Sam wasn't looking forward to a drive to LA.

He will have to quit his job as soon as possible, he realizes. In fact, he should do it today. The thought pings some emotion in him, but it's unimportant in the face of recent events. He'll tell Carl this evening, after his shift ends. Not the monster part, of course.

His brother is dead below ground while a monster walks the earth wearing his face. If that isn't understandable grounds for quitting, he doesn't know what is. 

Sam will get the Impala out of storage and go, start the task of finding out what the hell is going on. This life was always going to be temporary, he's always known that somewhere deep down where he's honest with himself. He's never managed to stick around anywhere long.

He's distracted thinking these dark thoughts, not paying attention to the clientele, but his instincts are still quick when he hears the crumpling sound of a magazine being mistreated in the back of the store, and he jerks his head up.

"—look at the tits on her—" he hears the taller of the teens mutter.

"—ew, she's old enough to be your mom—" says the second.

"Come on, just do it—"

Sam cranes his neck to see around a bookshelf, in time to catch sight of one of the teens shoving a magazine down the back of his pants. Sam was leaning on his elbows but he stands now as the two of them wander casually to the door, one with an obvious bulge of the hidden magazine sticking up the back of his jacket. The other one begins to whistle unconvincingly.

The tune dies on his lips when he catches sight of Sam standing at his full height behind the desk.

The kid's eyes widen. "Shit!" 

"Hey!" Sam calls, a beat too late.

The kid grabs his friend by the jacket and shoves. "Run!"

Sam jumps the desk in a move that would make a gymnast proud.

The bell over the door jangles as the door slams shut and Sam's halfway across the shop when the other customer, the guy who'd been browsing the spellcraft section, flies past him out the door.

Sam sprints off after them out on the sidewalk, rounding a corner just in time to see the customer tackle the kid and hold him by the hair over the concrete like he's threatening to smash his head in if he makes any sort of move.

"Whoa!" Sam hollers as he runs after them. "Take a step back man! This doesn't call for vigilante justice!"

The kid yanks the porno mag from his pants and throws it on the curb. "Take it!" he squeaks. "Take it! That's all I have, I swear." He puts his head down on the wet sidewalk, eyes squeezed shut.

Sam reaches them in time for the guy to shake the kid roughly, like a dog with a rabbit. It's an insurance claim waiting to happen and the small store cannot afford that.

"Jesus, dude." Sam grabs the man by the shoulder. 

Then he's staring up at the sky, flipped onto his back in three seconds flat.

"What the hell?"

He's aware of the kid making a break for it, and then reflexes kick in and Sam pushes off the ground and slams the man into the sidewalk to the satisfying sound of a body hitting concrete.

But it's not just anyone under him. It's Dean.

Blood is smeared at the corner of Dean's mouth and on his teeth as sneers at Sam from the gum-worn pavement. Sam is heaving for breath over him like he might never catch his breath.

"Dean," he croaks, and wonders if this is the sort of situation that warrants passing out in shock. He reaches to touch him, but Dean jerks away, like Sam's going to hit him.

"Hey, watch the face. I could have you arrested for assault."

Sam's fingers are sweating into the shoulder of Dean's shirt, a flimsy, cotton, purple plaid thing with fashionable buttons that bring out the green of Dean's eyes, and Sam chokes on a laugh.  
"It's you!"

Dean shoves Sam off him, glaring. "Watch the goods. I hope you're not some sort of stalker."

Sam's dropped onto his ass on the sidewalk, the humor leaving the situation real quick. "Dean?" He watches helplessly as Dean straightens his shirt.

"Thanks I get for trying to show some common decency," he mutters. "Caught that kid red-handed, then attacked on the street."

"Dean," Sam says, but Dean continues complaining to himself and brushing at the water that's soaked into his jeans. Sam raises his voice. "Will you leave the pants alone and look at me?"

Dean shoots him a look that usually means, _god I hope you don't have another concussion_. "These were two hundred bucks, dude."

Sam looks at him, really looks. Dean has dark boots on and a pair of grey shades that he slips over his eyes, light glinting off them. And he's tall, taller than Sam remembers him to be, especially from his vantage point here on the ground with the street traffic slowing, gawkers rubbernecking out rolled-down truck windows.

In fact, Sam notices then, there's a small crowd of passersby gathering near them, staring at Dean who seems larger than life. A monster, Sam remembers. He'd forgotten for one awesome minute that this isn't Dean, but now the fact hits him like a suckerpunch.

"Great. Just great," Dean says. "I'm out of here."

"Wha—" Sam says, struggling to his knees. The world tilts as the crowd parts to let his brother's body walk away, leaving Sam with one knee in a puddle, a rude return to reality.

He wants to yell after this version of Dean, this doppelganger, and only just resists the urge. He watches instead, craning his neck to see around people gathering, until Dean's form melts into the mouth of an alleyway.

A man steps directly into Sam's line of sight, drawing his attention. "Mind explaining yourself, son?" He's red in the face as he growls, "You could be arrested for that sort of stalking."

Sam gets to his feet and the guy backs down as Sam's height makes itself known.

"No, Dean Smith punched a kid," a woman tells the guy viciously. "This young man here is a hero for standing up to him."

"Yeah, just because he's famous doesn't mean he can just attack anyone in broad daylight, too!" says another woman.

"Abuse of power!" someone agrees. "Wish I'd gotten his autograph, though."

"Look, he didn't attack anyone, this is all a misunderstanding," Sam tells them. He's uncertain why he's trying to defend him, except through force of long habit. 

"But was that actually him? _The_ Dean Smith?"

"Sure looked like 'im."

"It was," swears a young guy in a wistful tone. "I'd recognize those emerald eyes anywhere."

The crowd murmurs to one another, as Sam notices the stolen magazine lying folded on the concrete. He considers it, squinting down at the cover featuring two women in heavy eyeliner french kissing. It's the goth porn.

Feeling sudden determination, Sam says, "Excuse me," to no one in particular. "I need to go have a word."

And suddenly he feels like the world is real again, like he's snapped out of whatever thrall of shock seeing Dean had caused.

"Dean Smith," murmurs someone behind him. "Pinch me."

Sam strides away. 

His heart picks up with each step and by the time he's gotten past the considerable crowd, he's jogging. There's hope in his heart suddenly. The feel of Dean's shoulder, the breadth of that goddamn smile— He lets himself believe for one second more that it might be his brother.

But when Sam reaches the alleyway, there's only empty paper cups littering the ground and an overturned trashcan with goop dribbling off its rim. Nothing else. Like a bad dream that continues when you open your eyes, Dean has disappeared.

 

 

 

Sam closes up shop half an hour early, four o'clock and to hell with the consequences. He needs tonight for research and now that he knows Dean is in town and attracting a crowd, finding him should be easy. Sam will wake up bright and early tomorrow to begin the hunt.

His roommate is barely clad, making out with a girl on the threadbare living room rug when Sam gets the door to his apartment open. This is not one of the perks of Sam's living situation.

"Jesus, Greg," he says, shielding his eyes and stepping into the bathroom. He strips off and gets in under the hot spray of the shower.

When he emerges five minutes later, hoping the coast is clear, he finds Greg and the girl sitting upright on the couch instead, clothed now and holding mugs of coffee. He makes a beeline for the fridge, suddenly ravenous.

"I'm Penelope, nice to meet you," the girl calls over to him.

"Um," Sam says. "Sam. You, too."

"He's a guy I found on the street," Greg lies to her. "I've been giving him a place to stay."

"Well that's very charitable," she says, sounding like she doesn't believe him but is humoring him anyway. "Can we play video games now?"

"Hell yes we can."

Sam heats up the leftovers from last night and goes to sit in the one armchair with his laptop. They don't have a kitchen table, the place is too small.

Greg has turned on the TV but pauses instead of switching over to video games, his mouth dropping open.

"YET ANOTHER BRUTAL MURDER IN THE DETROIT METRO AREA." The headline scrolls across the screen. "VICTIM'S EYES COMPLETELY REMOVED AND BODY LEFT IN DUMPSTER."

"Ew," Greg says.

"Wait, wait, wait," Penelope hits his arm. "Keep it on. Look!"

The hum of the news grows louder as Greg turns up the volume. His voice is strange as he asks, "Sam?"

"What's up?" Sam says around a mouthful of broccoli.

Hesitantly, Greg says, "Did you by any chance...beat up renowned actor Dean Smith?"

Sam jerks his head up to see that the news is broadcasting the street outside The Crypt, a headline splashed across the screen reading, "ACTOR VIOLENTLY ASSAULTED," along with a picture of a man who is clearly Sam pressing Dean into the sidewalk in a compromising manner.

Penelope gasps.

"Turn it up," Sam says.

The volume becomes audible just as the newscaster explains, "...just four hours ago, when a man came out of nowhere and tackled Hollywood's rising star Dean Smith to the ground. Dean Smith was the victor, and left the scene immediately. What is more, the quarrel seemed to be over this piece of pornography." The screen fills with a picture of the goth porn magazine, zooming to the two women, their tongues erotically entangled. 

"Oh my god," Sam says, chewing his food robotically as the TV flashes a few choice pictures of Dean in tight tank tops and one with him looking coyly at the camera wearing only star-spangled boxers. "This confirms everything," Sam says. "My life is a joke."

"Neither Smith nor his attacker is available for comment," says the reporter. "Smith has not pressed charges...yet. The actor is in town shooting the American movie remake of Korean Drama _My Love From the Stars_ , filming in our little northern slice of paradise until the end of the week, right in the heart of downtown."

Sam lets out an 'aha' so loud Penelope drops the game controller. Now Sam knows where to find him.

Penelope turns down the TV. "Are you ok? Did you really beat him up? And also, was he as good looking in person?"

"This is hilarious," Greg says. "You, obsessed with an actor. Did you at least buy him dinner first? What's his deal anyway?"

"It's a long story," Sam mutters. "I'll tell you when I find out myself."

 

 

 

He stays up until dawn scouring the internet for what little information there is on Dean Smith and watching the handful of movies Dean has been in. His rise to was quick, and Sam has to admit, this monster-posing-as-Dean is a good actor.

Sam will have to kill it, or be killed in the process - there's no other way this can go. Sam feels calmer now, the shock burnt off and his head in the game. It's not Dean. He thinks back on how there had been no flicker of recognition in Dean's eyes. Sam readies himself mentally to methodically slice and strip away layers of deception until he finds out the why and how and what happens next. He knows he should be feeling dread, some sort of unspeakable unease, but his blood is pumping and he feels almost...happy. Driven. He has a clear plan now and it feels good, being back on the hunt.

"Don't beat anyone up, you big bully," Greg calls after him as he heads out the next morning.

"I can't promise that," Sam says, and leaves the suffocating warmth of his apartment.

The Crypt is not far from where the movie is shooting. Sam thinks back on the good times he and Dean shared, and the bad. He passes small homes with scrawny cats sunning themselves on the uneven slats of porches, and then tall buildings where hot dog stands rejoice at the crowds the movie filming has created.

On the street five blocks over, he finds them. It's a zoo of film trucks and frenetic activity, and he jogs closer and crowds up against the caution tape that he's familiar with through a million crime scenes.

He cranes his neck to see if he can spot a familiar face, right along with all the other onlookers. There's a handful of fake pedestrians waiting for their cue, fake trees are being carefully placed amongst the sidewalk's real ones, lights are set up and taken down by burly crew members, and in the middle of it all, Dean, who is patiently sitting while his cheeks are dusted with blush by a makeup artist.

It's a chilling sight, a monster in Dean's skin in broad daylight. But he won't be going anywhere any time soon, so Sam allows himself to relax a little. It's like double vision — having Dean in his line of vision is calming and right, but it's all a lie. Sam fingers the vial of holy water in his jacket pocket alongside his phone and the handle of the small, silver blade, and exhales.

They're filming a sidewalk-argument scene, so Sam gets to hear his brother's voice again. And it's eleven o'clock when the shoot breaks for lunch. Dean ducks out after signing a couple autographs, and to Sam's luck, leaves the set.

Rounding a corner two blocks east, Dean ducks into a place Sam often grabs lunch. It's perfect coincidence. In better days, Sam might assume Dean was leading him there. But now it's pure luck.

Thinking quickly, Sam grabs a half-full styrofoam cup of coffee off an outside table and dumps holy water into it. Then, he lurks.

Dean comes out with a paper bag under one arm. Sam steps out at the right moment and knocks into him.

The collision is needlessly dramatic. Dean trips backwards and hits a lamp post while Sam's coffee goes flying. The lid pops off, the cup flings into the air and does a slow-motion nose dive while the tepid coffee arches and spills down Dean's white shirtfront. 

There's no smoking of flesh, Dean doesn't hiss or flinch back in pain. Not a demon then.

Instead, he just stands there in abject rage.

"Oh shit! I am so—" Sam yelps.

Dean's voice quivers as he sees just who he's run into. "You," he says.

Sam makes movements to soak up the coffee with the sleeve of his hoodie, but predictably achieves nothing. "It's soaking through your—" very sheer. "—t-shirt," 

"This shirt was—"

"Five hundred dollars?" Sam guesses.

"—a present," Dean finishes giving Sam an unimpressed look.

"Sorry," Sam repeats. He looks him over, taking in the Rolex and fancy shoes. Dean would laugh if he could see himself now.

"Dude," Dean says. "Who even are you?"

"Sam."

"Great," Dean says, flatly. "That's not what I meant."

Sam knows what he has to do, and he sees the best way to do it.

When he smiles, it feels wrong on his face. "Let me at least make it up to you," he says. "Come on. I have a ton of other shirts at my place."

Dean slides his sunglasses up into his hair just to roll his eyes at him.

Sam rolls his eyes back. "I mean, obviously I have shirts at my place."

Dean thinks about it. "Close?"

"Yeah, super close. Like three blocks." It's a lie, but not a big one.

"Fine. If it'll get you to shut up. I have to get to work in—" Dean checks the watch. "Great, twenty-five short minutes. Where to?"

They take a cab. The ride itself is fine, but then Dean tries to pay with a fifty as they pull up to the curb of Sam's street. The cab driver takes one look at him and goes red and says the ride's on him this time.

Nothing in life is free, not for them. Sam begins to laugh, maybe an edge hysterically, until Dean puts a hand on his shoulder, at which point Sam's skin begins to crawl.

"Bye, Mr. Smith," the cab driver says, and Dean nods like that's a name he's grown up with.

It's unnerving to say the least. They mount the stairs to Sam's apartment, and Sam tries the key first, jiggling the handle.

Dean lets out a low whistle. "You do live here, right? You're not planning on dumping my body in some abandoned building?"

"Dude, I'm not even a fan of your stuff," he says. "No offence." He yanks the nail out of the wall and picks the lock.

Dean mutters, "I'm not even going to ask."

Sam waves to the open door. "After you."

But Dean says, "No, after you. I insist." _Want to keep you in my line of sight so you don't go creepy stalker on me_ , hangs unspoken in the air.

The TV is on when they step inside, buzzing faintly, but the living room is empty. For the first time Sam notices that the apartment smells a lot like spilled beer.

Sam refuses to give Dean the tour, he's not Sam's brother after all and the sooner he can figure out what Dean is, the better. He hustles Dean into his small bedroom, slamming the door behind them in case his roommate is anywhere on the premises.

"So," Dean says, turning in place. He takes in the walls which are rough but scrubbed clean and Sam's modest belongings.

"So," Sam agrees. He points Dean to the line of t-shirts of various blues, greys, and whites, starkly hung in the closet in a regimented line. "Any of those."

While Dean's back is turned, he fingers the blade in his pocket. When Dean has the t-shirt over his head, he decides, he'll be able to see if silver has any effect.

Dean throws him a look, and Sam realizes he's staring as if waiting for Dean, the celebrity, to get naked. Half-naked.

"Oh," Sam says, but Dean shakes his head and strips off his shirt without a word. The fabric is so thin that he's able to ball it into his pocket. 

Sam waits. But instead of taking a new shirt, Dean wanders Sam's room. Shirtless. He still has the sculpted features of a minor god and those freckles that dust his shoulders that Sam remembers wanting to lick in his teenage years.

He catches sight of Dean's tattoo as he continues the circuit, the lines of ink ripped by a white scar from where Abaddon had taken his protection from him years back.

"Oh, this?" Dean says, apparently catching the look.

Sam shakes his head. "You don't have to explain anything to me."

Dean snorts, a joke only he thinks is funny. He pauses at the window, looking out at the broken street below. "I wouldn't be able to explain it anyway."

"Why not?"

"I don't remember."

"What do you mean?"

Dean continues, turning to him. "I don't remember how any of it happened."

It's said simply. Sam can't think of any reason a monster would deliver this lie, and can't imagine why Dean himself would have said it either.

"The tattoo?" Sam asks. "Or the scar?"

"All of it." Dean looks untroubled. "Don't remember much of anything past, hell, two years ago? Just woke up in a garden one day, and had to make my life up from there."

"A garden?" Sam can't breathe for a moment, hope stirring even though the disappointment is probably going to kill him. "When? Like, what month?"

"Uh," Dean says. "May? Ish? 2016."

It can't be true. And yet. The last time Sam saw his brother was when Dean was on his way to take on Amara, to sacrifice his life. 

Sam has taken his hand from the knife in his pocket, has forgotten the plan altogether. "So you're saying you have...what?" He laughs at the thought of it, although it's not at all a funny one. "Amnesia?"

Dean shrugs. "Call it what you want."

It's not what a monster would say.

"I just—" Dean makes a vague gesture. "Woke up. In the garden. Blazing headache, eyes aching. No ID, no car, no nothing."

It fits into place, the details of it. Something had gone down with God and Amara and Dean had never returned. Cas and Billie had told him that Dean was gone, and he'd believed them

Sam, embarrassingly, feels his eyes well up. He shouldn't believe this. But what purpose would lying like this serve? And if it's true...well, the idea is too much to bear.

"Oh yeah?" is all he can say.

Dean stops wandering the room at Sam's bed, a single mattress on the floor. 

He drops on one knee and Sam has the impression that he's going to drop to the pillows and sleep. But instead it's to retrieve a worn and comfortable black shirt that Sam has slept with for a number of nights, maybe months. He stands again and tugs it on.

It's one of Dean's own of course. He looks down and tugs on the front. "Huh, it fits."

If the story is true, and somehow Sam thinks it might be, This is Dean. Sam wants to believe that it is.

"Earth to Sam?"

"Huh?"

"Here, there's a scratchy tag in that one, let me cut it out." Dean turns and Sam comes up close behind him, pretending the find the tag by his neck but really just laying the silver blade against skin for a few seconds. There's no reaction on Dean's part, just a shiver that runs through him at the proximity. 

Sam breathes out.

"Hey, what's all this?" Dean's turned so he's staring directly at the bulletin board over the small desk. The board is pretty much empty — no yellowed scraps of articles ripped from papers, no red string connecting seemingly disconnected murders — there hadn't been any strings to grasp at. It had been squeaky clean, case closed.

The board is empty save one, heartbreaking photo of Dean himself. He's looking away, off frame at something. It's one Sam retrieved from the trunk to take with him before locking all the rest away.

"Uh," Sam flounders.

Dean taps it with a finger, then turns on Sam. "Not a fan, huh?"

Sam blinks. "I can explain."

Dean, regardless of whether he is Sam's brother, is currently a stranger. He spares the bulletin board another pitying glance and says, "Get a life, Sam."

He leaves the room in his old t-shirt, and Sam follows him to the front door at at a reluctant pace, head spinning.

"Dean," he says. "Hold up."

Dean turns, his hand on the knob.

He looks so much like himself right now. And if Sam lets him go, he has a feeling Dean isn't coming back.

If what Dean says is true, then he woke up to a blank slate and had to create himself from there. And now he has a life. No more living at the very edge of humanity where civilization meets desperation, but a new one — one of tall buildings, of paychecks with multiple zeros, and more booze than any person can drink.

Dean still hasn't opened the door.

"Are you happy?" Sam blurts out.

Dean laughs. "What?"

Sam swallows hard, and pushes on past the derisive smirk on Dean's unchanged face. "With your life. As an actor and all that. Are you happy?"

Dean chews his lip, like he might be giving it actual thought before he answers.

"Sure, it's pretty great."

"Just _pretty_ great?"

Dean shrugs. "I've got a job, a shit ton of money. And after waking up with no memory, in thrift store jeans in a hedge with security guards dragging me off private property, I'd say I'm doing really great actually."

"Right."

"I dunno. I like to imagine whoever I used to be would be proud to see how far I've come," Dean says. "Odds against me and I've built paradise out of nothing."

Sam nods silently.

Dean peers at him. "You okay, man?"

"It's nothing." Sam's heart aches. Happy is all he's ever wanted for Dean.

"Well," Dean says, when it's clear Sam's not going to continue. He gives him a salute. "See you around...Sam."

The click of the door, the buzz of the TV and the silence of Sam's thoughts. Sam leans heavily against the wall, the weight of the world settling on his shoulders.

"Dammit," he whispers. His breath comes out shakily. "God _dammit_."

He'd left Dean for dead, alone. And without the memories of his previous life, Dean's now able to live freely, to smile without the edge that used to color everything. He's finally been dealt a new hand, and there's no way in hell Sam will take that away from him.

When the door clicks open again, Sam head snaps up. Dean steps inside and Sam grins. For a moment the expression is so Dean's, he's sure that he remembers everything. Maybe seeing Sam broke through and everything came pouring back.

"Sunglasses," Dean says, retrieving them from the bookshelf by the door.

Sam laughs. "Who wears sunglasses in the winter, anyway?"

Dean gives Sam another look, one that's long and considering. One that stops at Sam's mouth. 

Before Sam can interpret that look, Dean steps into his space and explains it for him.

A kiss. Dean tugs him forward roughly but his mouth gentles the moment Sam gives back. His hand is firm along the side of Sam's jaw, his mouth parted against Sam's own.

But then Dean pulls back first, smiling. It's not a mean smile, or mocking as Sam would expect from him. It's just he looks untroubled, the smile foreign on his face.

"Wow, ok," Sam says. He is so out of his element. This wasn't a part of his plan when he woke up this morning...but really it wasn't _not_ a part of his plan, so. 

Dean quirks an eyebrow. "Just ok?"

"Uh," Sam says aware his face is flushed.

If he fixes Dean's memory, his brother is going to kill him for this.

Dean looks smug. And again, happy.

"You're welcome," Dean says, and when the door clicks shut this time, it doesn't reopen. 

Sam stays. He stays there as Dean leaves his apartment to return to the movie set, and the next day and the following, and as Dean leaves the city for more exotic locales.

He stays in Detroit for months and doesn't follow.

Scratch everything else, this is the hardest decision of his life. Dean was dead for years, but the real terror starts now. It's worse than Sam could have imagined.

 

[masterpost](http://glovered.livejournal.com/159131.html)

Another shitty Christmas comes and goes. Sam's present to himself is imagining Dean spending the entire holiday season in the midst of an orgy, sipping champagne and eating junk food while hot model-types laugh at his stupid jokes. The way things should have been for him, had they not been dealt a bad hand in life.

There's a box in the back of Sam's closet that's been closed for years. As another present to himself, he cracks the lid on New Year's Eve, and retrieves a satchel of herbs and a can of spray paint.

It's a bad idea to bring a supernatural being into one's apartment, so he finds an abandoned warehouse to do the summoning. He shakes the spray paint canister and sprays the geometric trap, stands back, and says a summoning in latin. 

Billie is unimpressed at the sight of him. She assesses him where he stands a careful distance away.

He is out of her reach, but he can feel the delicious longing he always feels in the presence of a reaper, like she would take him from all his earthly strife if only he would follow. "You must know why I summoned you," he says.

She inclines her head. Her only response is, "Make it quick."

"You told me he was dead. I know your kind doesn't tend to lie, so what's the truth?"

She nods. "His soul hasn't been reaped if that's what you mean. I told you he sacrificed himself, not that he'd physically ceased to exist."

There are a hundred ways word can be twisted. Sam shakes his head. "Why can't he— What's wrong with him?"

"Think about it, Sam. We've been here before. What do you do with a man who brushed too close to something humanity should not know." She taps her forehead.

Sam reels. "A wall? Something put a wall in Dean's head?"

"Now that wasn't so hard."

"But, why?" It's been years and Sam still wakes up sweating from nightmares of his own wall. He doesn't want to think about why Dean would need one.

"A gift from God, of course, for his service. Dean needed time to heal after all those souls were shoved in there. A human vessel is compactly made for just one, and Dean was overloaded."

Sam forces himself to stay calm. "So is he? Healed, I mean?"

She gazes at him. "Does it matter? You've made your choice, and I think it's a noble one. Leave your brother in peace."

"It matters."

"I've given you what you wanted. Now let me _out_."

Sam nods mutely, and scratches a line in the paint to break the trap. She leaves him with a whispered warning, "If you summon me again, you'd better have a _very_ good reason."

 

 

 

 

To say Sam has an easy time of it would be untrue. Living with the knowledge that his brother is alive and well and living in Los Angeles is trying at best. But Sam manages. He's managed this long, and he will continue to do so.

It's a quiet time in his life, an acceptance that's almost worse than acceptance of Dean's death. An acceptance that Dean is alive and has proven himself capable of living without Sam.

But Sam tries not to think about that. Months pass, and soon it's the end of April, and with it comes an unseasonal heatwave. There's a new wave of summer blockbusters that means every billboard and magazine is advertising Dean's face.

"We were thinking of seeing that one next week, opening night," Lily says as a bus drives by outside the shop window, plastered with Dean in fireman attire. "It's supposed to be super intellectual."

"God save us all," Jack says. They're crowded in the small, empty shop on their lunch breaks, lounging against bookshelves while Sam goes over the monthly earnings. Sam smiles down at the ledger, shaking his head. Sam knows he'll duck out of the movie. He already tortures himself enough, thank you very much.

Seeing the smile, Ray leans in over the counter. "Hey, if us manly men have to go, so do you." 

"Am I not counted among you 'manly men'?" 

"You all secretly love his movies," Tara tells them. "Real men don't lie to themselves about their feelings."

"Speaking of," says Lily. "You-know-who is becoming a middle-aged man soon."

"Who's you-know-who?" Sam says.

All eyes turn to him.

"What?" Sam says. "Oh come on, mid-thirties isn't that big a deal."

"We'll keep it low key," Ray promises. "And I can't believe I had to find out your birth date from your license."

Sam shrugs. He's never been big on celebrating.

"Like a fine wine, Winchester." Jack unwraps a mint from the counter and pops it into his mouth.

Carl emerges from the back with a stack of Dungeons & Dragons guides. "Watch it, I'm turning fifty in June."

"Sorry, Carl," they chorus. He flips them off before disappearing into the back.

"Well, lunch break's over anyway," says Tara. "See ya."

Each day melts into the next, and Sam tries his best not to think. He spends most of his off-work hours on the terrace roof of his building, lying in the rickety lounge chairs left by previous tenants and subsisting on iced tea and ninety-nine cent microwave pizza. 

"Two more of supermarket's finest," he tells Greg one afternoon, clambering onto the roof while holding a paper plate steady in each hand.

Today he worked the morning shift at the Crypt, so now he's treating himself to a well-deserved afternoon of relaxation. He puts the plates down on the nearest table, just as Greg's answering a call. 

"'Lo?" Greg says, grabbing a pizza slice and folding it into his mouth. "What? I don't think he wants one."

Sam picks up the day's paper and reads the headline. "What the hell?" he mutters to himself.

This is getting weird now. The headline is splashed across the front page: another gruesome murder. Possible serial killer. "Huh, eyes gouged out…" he reads.

"Yeah, ok fine," Greg says into the phone, and hangs up. He hands Sam the cell and then relaxes back into his own chair, taking another bite of pizza.

Sam looks at the phone. "Hey, that was mine? Who called?"

Greg shrugs. "Some weirdo."

Sam waits another beat while Greg desperately tries to fan his mouth around hot cheese. Finally prompting, "And?"

Greg looks surprised the conversation is still happening. "What?"

"Dude. Who was on my phone?"

"Oh. Wrong number."

"Really."

Greg shrugs. "Some guy going on about how he wants to give you a shirt. Probably a marketing scheme. He gave me some superhero name. I get batshit calls all the time, best just to hang up."

"Oh. Ok." Sam lies back with his pizza. 

"Said something about a coffee stain."

Sam flips his sunglasses up again. "Wait, coffee stain?"

Greg says, "Yeah. On a shirt. You definitely don't want what he's selling, sounds like you could get a better shirt in a store."

" _Greg_."

"Or maybe that wasn't it, maybe he wanted to give you back a shirt? No, that doesn't make sense." He picks crumbs off his chest. "I dunno."

Sam checks the call log, and of course the last call was from a blocked number.

"Shit."

"Did you know him or something?"

"Greg. Seriously, think. Did he mention _anything_ else."

"Something about his hotel. I don't know, man."

"In town? As in, he's here now?"

Greg lays back on the lounge chair and stretches. "Dude, answer your own phone in the future. I'm not your secretary."

"Jesus, now I have to climb all the way down the building again to get my laptop," Sam complains. They're...not exactly supposed to be up here.

"Please, you'll be fine. You're like a ninja."

When Sam gets back to the roof, barely saving his laptop from a two storey drop, he pulls up a list of all of the hotels in the downtown area. Because if Dean called him, Sam rationalizes, then he must have remembered something. He must need Sam. And Sam is willing to leave Dean alone for as long as there's a reason, but he's too selfish not to come when Dean calls.

"Please be downtown," he mutters, because the list is already long. He points his pen at Greg, "This is your fault," he says, and starts at the top.

He calls over twenty hotels asking for Dean Smith before someone pauses in a suspicious manner.

Sam seizes upon it. "So he _is_ staying there. Look, I desperately need to get in contact with him. It's an emergency."

"Sir, I did not say that," says the concierge. "We have a great number of guests staying at our fine establishment, but no one currently going under the name 'Dean Smith.'"

"Oh." Sam picks up the list, sighing.

The man repeats, slowly, "There's no one by _that name_ here."

Sam grins at the confirmation that Dean actually is there. "Ok, Batman. Obviously." 

"Not that hero, no."

His face falls. "Uh, Robin?"

"No."

"Oh. Well then…Superman?" Sam asks, feeling a little embarrassed.

"No."

"Cat Woman? Green Lantern? Arrow?"

There was a time Dean would have chosen a respectable superhero, but the concierge only gives in once Sam says the name "Martian Manhunter," a minor hero Sam finds by scrolling through Wikipedia while he talks.

"Why yes. Mr. Manhunter is staying in our honeymoon suite. He left a message for you to meet him at three o'clock this afternoon."

Sam rolls his eyes. "Thanks. You've been a big help."

 

 

 

The elevator is gold paneled, and Sam's feet sink into the plush carpet when he steps out into the hallway of the top storey. Making his way to Dean's room, Sam passes twenty doors, maybe, and a fancy vending machine loaded with quality items rather than shitty ones. He's reminded of life as he used to know it, living in a thousand near-identical rooms, often subsisting only on chips and twinkies and the conviction that it was all worth it.

"Keep your head in the game," he says to himself again, shaking his head clear of the reverie.

He has a clear goal here. He'll talk to Dean, assess the situation, and then decide the best action to take. Maybe he'll be forced to tell Dean everything. And then they'll take it from there.

The honeymoon suite is situated at the end of the quiet hall. Sam loiters outside for a moment, then gives a soft knock. He waits for a moment, before putting his hand on the knob to test if it's locked. 

The knob turns, someone opening the door at the same time but from the inside. Dean must have just come to the door. To take every precaution, Sam steps to one side, flattening his back against the wall to wait. 

Sure enough, it's not his brother.

"Ahem."

A man in shirtsleeves is peering out the door at him. Sam steps away from the wall and smooths his shirt front.

"You," the man asks, with emphasis. "Are here for the interview?"

"Ah, um." Sam rocks on his heels, intelligently. He checks the room number and it matches the one he was given. "...I'm here to see Dean?"

"Name?"

"Uh...Sam?"

The guy shakes his head and consults a clipboard he has in his hand. He adjusts an ear piece and looks Sam up and down. "Sure, Sam. Well? Are you coming in or not? Mr. Smith doesn't have all day, and there is a line, you know."

"Line?" Sam asks, peering in through the door. He sees that there's a row of chairs against one wall where four guys in suits are sitting waiting.

The man coughs expectantly.

"Ah," Sam says. "I'm just— you know, just star struck, I guess."

"Magazine?"

"Huh?"

"That you work for," the guys says, followed by a muttered, "They need to start background checking."

"Oh, right, right, magazine." Sam casts about for something, anything, and his eyes land the vending machine again. "Uh...Twinkie? Twinkies?"

"Pardon?"

"Yes. Twinkies," Sam repeats, standing straighter and getting behind his story. "That's where I work. It's a serious publication."

The man shakes his head and scribbles something on his clipboard. "Word to the amateur?" he says, gesturing Sam in. "When you actually meet Mr. Smith, take a few deep breaths and for godssake, keep it in your pants. I've pencilled you in for 4 o'clock. You have ten minutes to get it together."

Inside, he can hear Dean's voice droning in the background. This is comforting. The way things are going, it seemed possible Dean wasn't here at all.

Dean's tone is affable, the voice he used to use when interviewing the scared witnesses to horrific crimes. Sam's chest constricts at the Dean's laughter, a sudden sound.

He drops a chair, in line with the other people who he assumes are reporters, and tries to decide how he's going to play this.

"You new?"

An attractive man in a suit next to him holds out his hand. Sam shakes, noting the crispness of his tie. Sam is way underdressed for this in his worn jeans and flannel.

"Yeah," he says. "You're not the first guy who's asked me that. What gave it away?"

"Well, you're bouncing your leg for one, and sweating like a pig."

Sam stops jiggling his knee, and crosses his legs at the ankle.

"Very observant. You must be a reporter," Sam says, which gets him a laugh. "Who do you work for?"

"I'm from _Time_."

Sam chokes on air. "Well," he wheezes after a short coughing fit. "Dean Smith _is_ a, uh, great actor. I guess."

"That's what my boss said when she assigned me this project," the guy agrees. He leans in and says, "Me? I'm just angling for an autograph. My boyfriend loves this douchebag, and our three month anniversary's coming up."

"Right, good idea."

"So, you into his work?"

"Yes," Sam says, nodding seriously. "But I also came to see if he can get me a part in his latest project. What was it called again—?" he fishes.

A woman with a clipboard sticks her head in the room, calling, "Wilson?"

The guy stands and smooths his tie so it lies even flatter against his pristine shirt. He winks down at Sam before leaving, telling him, "Well, hope you get your big break."

When it's Sam's turn, the woman ushers him into the inner room, which is lined by security detail. Photographers lurk in corners, and Dean is seated on a stiff-looking sofa. The woman directs Sam to take a seat, and makes the introductions.

"Mr. Smith, may I introduce Sam Winchester, from a local publication," she says. "Twinkies. Mr. Winchester, you have five minutes."

Sam slowly settles on the opposite sofa. "Ok," he says, trying to catch Dean's eye meaningfully to find out what the hell is going on. "Sure. Um." 

He'd hoped they'd be alone at least, but no luck.

Dean is looking at him politely like they've never met before. For a moment Sam wonders if maybe Dean doesn't have recurring bouts of amnesia and he's forgotten him again. Meaning he doesn't remember beating up Sam in the street, or the kiss.

Speaking of, Sam wishes _he_ could remember anything about the currently-filming side of Dean's IMDB page.

Almost a fifth of his time has passed, he realizes, spent just gaping at Dean. He clears his throat. "Good morning, Mr. Smith."

Dean nods. "Good morning."

Sam clasps his hands in his lap, wishing he still kept a notepad on him at all times for moments like these. "You sure have a large fanbase," he starts. "What can you tell the readers of our exclusive magazine about your latest project?"

"It's going well," says Dean. His eyes flick briefly up to Sam's, then away. "Filming is part of the way through, and it's looking good."

Sam waits for more, but that seems to be all Dean's going to give him.

"Right. What do you most think will interest our readers?"

"The adventure, probably."

"Great," Sam nods. "I know our readership will be glad to hear that. So."

He can't tell, but he thinks Dean is starting to look embarrassed, which is a relief.

"So," says Sam. "As you know our magazine caters both to the queer community and lovers of the afamed snack food. What we would like to know iw, will there be any vending machine snacks in the film?"

Dean smiles and says, "No."

"Mr. Winchester, your time is nearly up," says the clipboard-wielding woman.

"Great. Of course." Sam casts about for another question and comes up with, but Dean beats him to it.

"You said your last name was Winchester?"

Sam leans forward. "Yes. It is."

Dean nods. "Isn't that a gun or something?"

"Yes, it is."

"Cool."

Sam collapses back, weariness settling over him. "Right, yeah. Do you have any final words for the readers of Twinkies?"

"I do actually," says Dean.

"Oh thank god," Sam says. "I mean, this will be very interesting to them."

"I'd like to make a restaurant recommendation."

Sam frowns. "Ok, shoot."

"Last time I was in the city," Dean says, finally engaging him in serious eye contact. "I happened upon a nice little place, pretty close to here actually. It's called Alexander's on 3rd, and it's a great place to grab a drink and talk."

"Oh. Ok."

"I always go at seven p.m. sharp," Dean continues.

Sam nods and tries to convey his understanding non-verbally. He may be out of the game, but he knows a lead when he's handed one. "All right," he says, and stands. "Well, that's all I have for you today. Thank you for your time."

 

 

 

Sam is at the restaurant by six-thirty. It's a fancy place, and he idles with a newspaper ("New eye-gouging victim found in river at local park") a ways down the sidewalk until he sees Dean approach at seven on the dot.

"Thank god I'm out of there," Dean says by way of greeting. He gives an exaggerated shiver.

Sam falls into step next to him. "Don't like reporters?"

"No, don't like that much attention, period."

"Right." Sam holds the door of the restaurant open for him, and it's not a weird thing to do, he's always sort of done it, but Dean gives him a weird look over his shoulder. They're seated by a man in a waistcoat and Sam tries to look around without being too obvious. It's candlelit, there are tasteful portraits of a moustachiod man on the walls.

"Are those all of Alexander?" he asks Dean.

Dean snorts. "Probably. Seems the type."

"Yeah, named a restaurant after himself."

Their eyes catch for a moment, and Sam is the first to look away.

"So," he says. He awkwardly shoves his swan-shaped napkin into his lap. "This place is...crazy nice."

Dean nods. "It's all right. I found it last time I was in Detroit. You never eaten here?"

Sam shakes his head.

"They have burgers to _die_ for. I mean, seriously." Dean unfolds and settles his napkin over one knee with ease. "Hey, sorry about earlier. I completely forgot that I had interviews."

"It's fine."

"You handled it well."

Sam snorts. "Sure."

Dean laughs and Sam just shakes his head, hiding his smile.

When the waiter asks if the monsieur would like wine, Dean says, "No, no, just a beer. Whatever's on tap."

There are vestiges of the real Dean everywhere. If this weren't a horrible tragic situation, Sam thinks he would be very interested to see how this amnesia thing worked.

They settle into a quiet sort of moment. Sam squints at Dean, trying to see anything else on his face.

When their drinks come, Dean raises his glass in a suggestion of a toast before taking a sip. "So, you're probably wondering why I called."

"Yeah. I mean, yes, I really would like to know." He's at the edge of his seat.

"You seem surprised to hear from me. Can't a guy call his friend when he's in town?"

Sam raises an eyebrow. "I wouldn't say we're exactly friends."

"Alright. Yeah." Dean rubs a hand over the back of his neck and sighs. He studies the perfectly white tablecloth for a long moment, and Sam realizes this really might not be good news. "I've been having these...uh...these dreams," Dean starts.

Sam leans in. "Dreams?"

"Dude, calm down. Not _those_ kind of dreams." Dean smirks. "I mean, one of them I admit, but that was like...let's not talk about that."

Sam laughs nervously.

"Just weird...weird dreams."

"Care to elaborate on that?"

"Bad," Dean clarifies. "Like, children's greatest fears sort of bad."

"Oh yeah?" Sam can imagine.

Dean downs half his beer and clears his throat. He seems anxious just thinking about it, Sam can only imagine what a normal person like him would think when faced with thoughts of their-level violence.

"Nothing a grown-ass adult should be having," says Dean. "But, they won't stop. And you're in them, fighting them. Sort of the star of the show, in every one. Lord knows why you specifically. I mean, you fit the part." 

He looks Sam over again, and Sam shifts but doesn't deny it.

"So my therapist told me—"

Sam coughs around a sip of his own beer.

"—my _therapist_ ," Dean says louder of Sam's incredulous noises. "Says that I should confront you about it. Then maybe I can move on."

Sam wipes his eyes. "Sorry, it's just I've always said you should go to therapy."

"Gee, thanks stranger."

"No, I mean— I mean, good for you."

Dean waves him off. "So anyway. Long story short, I have dreams about you. Please get out of my head."

They lapse into silence, this one more life-endingly depressing on Sam's part. 

"How are you?" Sam finally asks. He really wants to know.

"You mean beside the nightmares?"

"Yeah."

"Fine. Just fine. You? How's the bookstore? You seeing anyone?"

"Fine. And fine. And, um, no."

Dean looks surprised, which is gratifying. "Why not?" He considers him. "I guess you do seem like a dude who might have deal-breaker type fetishes."

"Thanks," Sam says flatly. Messed up forever by a host of monsters and other big bads is more like it. Sam could give him a laundry list. "Heartbroken, actually," is what he says. "In a way."

"Oh yeah? You left them or they left you?"

"He left me," Sam says.

He's not angry at Dean, obviously. But it feels good to blame him for a second to his face.

"Bastard," Dean says.

"Totally," Sam agrees and is thankful when their food comes.

His salad is amazing. He's assuming Dean is going to pay, because the salad alone is $25 dollars and Sam is a week away from his next paycheck. He watches as Dean takes a messy bite of his burger, how Dean's eyes flutter closed for a second as he savors it. "Wasn't his fault," Sam tells him. "I don't blame him."

A conversation behind them becomes apparent as they're finishing up, loud enough to hear from two tables away. Sam's attention is caught by something that sounds like Dean's name.

It's a couple guys laughing it up over drinks. One of them says, "No way. Give me Dean Smith any day."

Sam and Dean look at each other. Dean quirks an eyebrow and makes a show of leaning back to listen with his hands behind his head.

"Yeah," one laughs. "He's the one actor my wife made me promise she could bone if the opportunity presented itself."

Dean grimaces, and Sam holds back a smile.

"My wife likes that other one — blonde, kind of scrawny but chicks dig him."

Dean mouths, "Brad Pitt."

The guy at the table says, "—Brad Pitt."

Sam kicks Dean under the table and Dean winks at him. "Brad Pitts not scrawny," he whispers and Dean shrugs.

Another guy cuts in. "God I hate those movies. Trashy romance."

"Smith's the guy with freckles, right? Vacant eyes?"

"Yeah, drug-induced, definitely. I heard he's in rehab right now."

Sam points at Dean and mouths, "Now?"

Dean shakes his head, smiling as he finishes his beer.

"Poor rich boy. Too much blow?"

"Or blowjobs. Have you seen that mouth?"

The smile on Dean's face fades, and Sam's sense of humor with it.

"I mean, I'm not gay or anything," one of the says. "But I can see the appeal. Maybe if you close your eyes…?"

"Ok, that's it." Sam stands, his chair scraping back.

"It's fine," Dean says, but Sam is already moving toward the table.

The men are at a table covered in empty cocktail glasses and appetizer plates, wearing smug suits to match the smug smiles that Sam can't wait to wipe off their faces.

"Hi. Sorry to bother you guys," Sam starts. "But—"

One sneers up at him, looking at Sam's muddy boots and plaid. "Well, you're definitely not the waiter. How'd you get in here?"

"Yeah, here's the thing," Sam says over him. "I try not to spend time on douchebags like you—"

"Hey!"

"But the guy you're talking about is a real person. So keep your voices down, no one wants to hear what you have to say."

One of the men half-stands. "Yeah, well no one wants to see your face, but you obviously haven't gotten _that_ memo."

Sam opens his mouth to respond but a hand on his elbow drags him away. 

"Dude, let's go," Dean says. "They're not worth it."

Sam grinds his teeth. "I'm sorry. I just can't handle dicks like that."

Dean hands his credit card to a waiter who has hastened to their side. He flashes Sam a chagrined smile. "It's ok, man. It's nice that you tried. I mean, it would be cool if I could have a civil conversation with every person who has a wrong opinion, but—"

"But?"

Dean pauses, like a thought has just occurred to him. "You know what?"

He does an about face, walking straight back to the table.

"Hi," he says, interrupting the men's loud laughter.

The first guy drops his fork with a clatter when he sees who's addressing them. "Holy shit…"

Dean jerks his thumb to where Sam is looming over his shoulder. "I'm sorry about gigantor here. He's _very_ sensitive."

"You heard—"

Dean waves off whatever stuttering explanation he's about to hear. "Look I know how it is to meet after work, blow off some steam bullshitting with your friends. Just hanging with the guys, right?"

"Right," says one of them, face pale. "That's all it was."

"I also know that your wives think about me while they're deigning to have sex with you. Which is fine for me." He smiles. "Well, good talk. Have a good night."

Done, Dean leaves. Sam trails him out of the restaurant, grinning.

"Dude."

"I shouldn't have done that," Dean says. "I really shouldn't have done that." But there's very little remorse in his voice. He looks at Sam, pulling his jacket around him tighter against the breeze. "You know, I thought you were going to punch him in the face for a second there."

Sam clenches his jaw. "Ha. Well, it was definitely an option."

Dean smiles at that for some reason, and shakes his head. "You know, I don't get it."

"What?"

"You don't treat me like I'm famous. And you make me feel like I'm allowed to act like a normal guy. Which is crazy, by the way. Because if there's one way I'm not allowed to act, it's that." They wait on a corner until the light turns green. Dean looks thoughtful. "What am I doing with you?"

Sam's been asking himself the same about Dean all night.

The way Dean is looking at him, honest, with the light casting one side of his face in shadows — Sam knows with a sudden, complete certainty that this is it. Tonight is the end. He can't go on torturing himself like this, and Dean himself has said himself he wants Sam gone so he can live with complete peace of mind. Sam will have to cut off all contact with Dean, for good this time. 

"Hey," Dean says, noticing the shift in mood. The light's turned. "Where'd you go?"

"Nowhere," Sam says, pulling up his jacket collar against a breeze. "I'm right here."

They continue in the direction of Dean's hotel at a slow amble. If Dean's elbow brushes Sam's too often to be accidental, Sam pretends not to notice. Dean is smiling to himself and Sam feels like his life is ending all over again, walking too fast toward the end of his life.

When they reach the hotel, Dean idles with his hands in his pockets, looking up at Sam from up close.

"Well, this is me." He says. Sam looks past him at the massive hotel, ferrari owners handing their keys to chauffeurs and a bellboy discreetly smoking a cigarette by the gilded doors. "Do you want to come up?"

It's casual, but Sam can feel the meaning behind it. It's killing him. "I really, _really_ can't," he says. He looks at every one of Dean's features, trying to memorize him all over again in the flash of headlights.

Dean reaches out and pokes Sam in the chest, very deliberately, then leaves his finger there. "You know, Sam. Correct me if if I'm wrong, but…"

He trails off until Sam looks him in the eyes.

"I know that you're interested," Dean says. And when Sam doesn't answer, he asks, "Was it the kiss? It's not your fault, you know. I heard someone say recently, I have an irresistible mouth. I mean, they were talking about blowjobs, but..."

Sam rolls his eyes when Dean snickers at his own joke.

Dean is still standing too close, and Sam should be anywhere but here. He shakes his head. "Sorry man, wouldn't want you to have any more of those dreams."

"I have a bottle of scotch," Dean says. "Real old, goes down smooth."

"Of course you do." At Dean's questioning look, Sam caves. "Never mind. I guess I could have a drink." He can let himself have this one last drink. Fuck it, he deserves a final toast to a long ride.

Dean's hand leaves warmth when he moves away. "Great, give me five minutes, then come up. You know which room."

Sam watches him go. He follows inside at a slow pace, and proceeds to lurk around the ostentatious flower arrangements in the lobby, blending in passably aside from the few concerned glances he gets from the front desk.

Four minutes later, he rides the elevator up to the top floor and steps softly along the quiet hotel corridor.

It can't end like this, but it has to. Just because it's not life or death right now, Sam knows the choice he has to make, knows that sometimes there are choices you make in life, and you have to really dedicate yourself to them. He'll allow himself this one moment of weakness, and then it's over. 

Dean swings the door open when Sam knocks, cheeks flushed. "Hi."

"Hi." Dean looks beautiful, familiar, and he's been waiting for Sam. This is the last time Sam is going to see his brother.

Dean is no longer on the same page. "You have to go," he whispers.

Sam blinks. "Huh?"

"Go. Now." Dean enunciates the words clearly, quietly.

"But I thought—"

"My boyfriend," says Dean. "Who I thought was in New York. Is in the bathroom."

"Your," Sam starts, but can't finish the thought out loud, let alone in his head.

"Boyfriend." Dean's eyes are comically wide, as he nods for Sam to leave down the hallway. "Go."

A noise from the bathroom confirms the existence of a boyfriend, and a voice. "Hey babe? Who's at the door?"

Dean tries to shove Sam out but Sam is dead where he stands.

"What the hell, Dean?"

"Uh... room service," Dean calls, then leans into Sam's space to whisper, "Dude, leave."

Then Alec Baldwin steps into view, and Sam is very alarmed.

"No freaking way," Sam says in lieu of laughing like an insane person. 

Alec Baldwin towels his hair dry, unfazed by Sam's outburst. He must get that reaction all the time.

"Room service, great," he says. "You know, I thought you guys had some kind of uniform you had to wear."

If Sam had known this morning that today would necessitate multiple disguises, he would have worn the fed suit that's been folded and forgotten in a corner of his closet. "Well, uh, yeah normally, but—" he flounders, adjusting his jacket. He looks to Dean, who is no help. "I just changed to go home, but I thought I'd just deal with this final, uh, room service order?"

"Oh great." Alec Baldwin starts unbuttoning his shirt. "I'm dying for some sushi."

"Sushi?"

"Yeah, you know, the rice and the seaweed and all that. You do have sushi here, right? I thought this was a five star establishment." 

Sam finds himself vaguely outraged on behalf of his adopted hotel. "Yes, I know what sushi is. I'll see what I can do."

"And get us some new pillows while you're at it. Make sure they're firm, none of those soft ones."

"Absolutely," Sam nods. "Firm pillows."

"And maybe empty the trash on your way out."

"Right," he says with more hesitation. No real choice here, he stoops to pick up the trash can, putting it under one arm.

Dean puts up his hands to stop him, horrified. "Really—" he half turns. "He doesn't have to do that. I don't think that's his job."

Sam is amazed again at the difference he's seen in Dean, whose cheeks are burning red in embarrassment. It's like Sam is looking at a completely different person.

"Sorry," Alec Baldwin tells Sam. "Dean, there's a stained pair of your pants in there. Looks like blood on them or something, I don't want that in the room."

"Ketchup," says Dean quickly, in a way that strikes Sam as odd. But so does everything he says lately.

"You're so clumsy," Alec Baldwin chides. "Can't leave you alone for a second."

"Ok, I'll be going now," says Sam.

Alec Baldwin smiles and comes across the room. "What's your name?"

Sam flounders. "Ah...Bernie."

Alec Baldwin, the actor who he and Dean have repeatedly mocked every time he's graced the screen of their motel televisions, shakes Sam's hand. Sam looks down to find he has slipped a ten dollar bill into his palm.

"Thank you, Bernie." He turns his attention back to Dean. Dean, his boyfriend. "Hey, I thought we could throw around some cash on the town, but I can also show you a good time here. What do you think?"

"Yeah, let's stay in," Dean says faintly.

Alec Baldwin kisses him, for an extended and unnecessary amount of time, then he winks at Sam. "He hates surprises, didn't know I'd be here. Dean, order fast ok? Let's let Bernie get home."

He wanders off into the bathroom again.

Sam is still holding the trash can. He is starting to relate to it on a deep level. "I should go," he says.

Dean just nods.

Before the door closes behind him, Sam turns. "Ok," he says. "This is not something I expected."

It makes him feel the slightest bit better that Dean looks one hundred percent mortified when he says. "I don't know what to say."

"I think the word you're looking for is 'goodbye,'" Sam says. "So, goodbye."

He leaves the room, just him and his trash can. And Dean doesn't follow.

Sam makes it out of the hotel without collapsing to the floor in despair. It's something he'll feel proud of in the future. But for now he feels numb where his heart used to be, which he supposes is normal in these sort of circumstances.

Stepping out of the lobby and into the cold, he shakes his head again and thinks maybe this was for the best. 

"Enough," he tells himself. "That's enough now."

His old life is gone, and there's no way to get it back.

There's a dumpster around the side of the hotel where he drops the small trash can on his way out. In doing so, the light-colored slacks Alec Baldwin mentioned fall to the ground at Sam's feet.

They are indeed stained with blood.

Sam crouches down. There's no tear in the material at all, Sam checks, so it wasn't from a scraped knee or something equally as benign. And it's a lot of blood.

A large amount, in fact. It's more than you'd expect from a cut, for instance, more what you'd expect from a stab wound. All in all, his initial and only somewhat-informed blood splatter analysis leads him to conclude that the wearer of these pants stabbed someone from a standing position.

This is a curveball to an already confusing situation. Things have changed, the story more strange. 

"Just when you think you know a guy," Sam says, and goes to get his car.

It looks like he will be sticking around after all.

 

 

 

Sam parks his car across the street from the hotel, where he pulls up the collar of his jacket, gets comfortable, and waits.

It's been a long time since Sam's been on a good stakeout, and even longer since he's had to endure one alone without intermittent witticism and bad takeout. Without Dean keeping him awake, Sam's eyes grow noticeably heavier as it nears the two hour mark, and he has to do car stretches to keep himself alert.

On his phone, he works off a terrible hunch, and compares the location of the eye-gouging murders with known filming dates of Dean's many projects. It seems impossible, but it also feels wrong to leave a stone this big unturned.

The results are less than promising, pointing to a reality Sam doesn't even want to consider. The last murder happened here two nights ago. The photo of the crime scene shows a body covered in a plastic sheet, a lighthouse in the background. _Mariner's Park at sunrise_ , it reads.

The park is not far from where Dean is currently engaging in whatever thing he and Alec Baldwin usually engage in.

If this were just any case, Sam would rate his certainty at ninety percent.

He turns off his phone, unable to keep thinking down this track. He stretches his legs out and leans back in his seat as he stares at the front of the hotel. The only thing he can do now is either follow Dean on a suspicious midnight walk, or wait for a murder and hope that Dean has an alibi.

But nothing happens. And by the time Sam starts his car and heads for home, he feels foolish. There are signs this could be Dean, but it's also highly unlikely that his brother would go on some sort of killing spree as a result of memory loss.

Sam gets back to his apartment by three and sleeps fitfully anyways, finally waking at five-thirty, suddenly and like he's been jerked from a dream, to a room that's grey with the hint of morning.

"Shit," he says to the discolored ceiling. He rolls to press his face more firmly into the pillow then checks his phone. It's always the days he doesn't have to work early that he wakes before dawn.

The hilarity of the idea that he could ever manage a normal job for any substantial period of time is enough to make him laugh aloud. It's possible he's been pretending this whole time, and that things were always going to go sideways.

Sam falls to the floor and does fifty pushups, a stab at keeping in shape, then he goes to the kitchen. He puts on water for coffee, and then puts bread in the toaster. He goes to collapse on the couch while he waits, but in walking across the still-dark living room, he's grabbed from behind.

He spins out of his attacker's grasp on socked feet, and just manages to land a kick before it's turned around on him. He finds himself flipped onto his back on his apartment floor.

"Dean?" Sam gasps.

Dean is grinning above Sam, a joker smile. His hand is just shy of closing around Sam's throat. Sam understands for a terrible second that Dean must know Sam suspects him, and has possibly come to kill him.

"Easy," Dean shushes. Sam thinks for a dramatic second that this is how he'd like to die.

"Dude, what are you doing here?" Sam whispers. He wonders then if Dean might kiss him again. The moment feels very intimate, just the two of them, Dean's body hovering over his own.

The lights flip on, sudden and blinding, and a voice says, "Keep it in the bedroom, Winchester."

Sam rolls out from under Dean and jumps to his feet to find his roommate heading to the kitchen. Greg is wearing yellowed tighty-whities and not much else.

"Oh," Greg says. "Dean Smith."

"Yes," Sam says.

"Hello," says Dean.

Greg pulls out the ice cream and eats a spoonful. Then, remembering himself, holds out the tub. "Want some?" he asks, like Dean isn't still lying on the floor and Sam isn't wide-eyed and panicking by the TV.

"No thanks," Sam says. 

Dean waves a hand from his position on the floor. "I'm fine, too."

Greg shrugs. "Your loss. See you gays later." He disappears into his room again.

"Sorry about him," says Sam, even though Greg maybe almost stopped Dean from killing him.

"It's fine," Dean says slowly. He gets to his feet. "You're not going to attack me again, are you?"

Sam is filled with incredulity. "You attacked me!" he says, but then deflates when he notices the bags under Dean's eyes. He looks like he hasn't slept at all. "And no, you're safe."

Dean looks longingly at the couch. "May I?"

"Of course." Sam waves for him to sit. He remains standing, and crosses his arms. "So why did you break in? Haven't you seen enough of me in the last twenty-four hours?"

"I didn't know where else to go," says Dean. "Although I'm rethinking that choice." Dean squints at Sam, who feels unfairly judged for his floral boxers with happy faces.

"You have your hotel room," Sam points out.

"I was woken up by a phone call from my agent an hour ago," Dean says. "I had to sneak out of the building, which was already being surrounded by paparazzi."

Sam feels a thrill run through him. "So why were they following you? You didn't...do anything that would be considered illegal, did you?" Like murder. He almost says it.

Dean's mouth tightens in a thin line. "It's just, there's been an issue. A leak. To the press."

"What kind of leak."

"A...video."

Sam frowns. "Video?"

"Yeah. The kind you might not want to get out to the world." He looks meaningfully at Sam.

"Oh." Sam stares at him. Then the meaning of the words settle in. " _Oh._ What, really? You?"

Dean remains silent.

Sam shakes his head. "I mean, I know you've always been a fan of— but I mean, no, I haven't seen it."

"Good," Dean says, a look of relief crossing his face. "Good. It's only been out for a few hours. Released in Europe. It'll be all over the tabloids today. I wouldn't recommend it, it's not my finest film."

Sam tries not to imagine but fails. He looks away. "So why didn't you stay with, you know, your much older boyfriend."

Dean snorts. "Broke up."

"Really?" 

"Yeah. Said he didn't want his reputation tarnished by said video. It had been coming for a long time though. Which...by the way. Sorry about that, earlier. In the hotel."

"No, I mean. It's fine."

It's stupid how much relief he feels about this.

"You know, I really _can_ find a hotel."

Sam steps in front of him. "No, stay here." He puts a hand up, just short of Dean's shoulder, then thinks better of it. He tries to inject as much meaning as he can in his tone. "Of course stay here. You're always welcome."

Dean takes a minute, searching Sam's face before he looks away. "Thanks."

"You hungry?" Sam calls as he heads to the fridge. He swings the door open. "I have — half a lemon and two pieces of bread. Well, that was underwhelming."

"No, I'm good," Dean says. "I don't eat carbs much, gives you a gut."

Sam snorts. "What about that burger last night?"

"That was my carbs for the week."

"I'll get you some water then. Clear your pores, or whatever."

He thinks he hears Dean mutter, "bastard" and smirks down at the glasses. But then he remembers the suspicion he'd felt just half an hour ago. The thought is sobering.

Keeping his voice deliberately casual, Sam calls, "Hey, speaking of good places to go in this city, I have a recommendation for you this time."

"Yeah? Where's that?"

"There's this lighthouse," he says, and although he feels bad baiting Dean, he's spent his life playing detective. The thought will nag him forever if he doesn't kill this suspicion once and for all. "Down by the water. Nice place to take a midnight stroll, clear your head. You haven't been down there ever, have you?"

He lets out a breath when Dean barely reacts to the question, pausing his couch pillow fluffing to answer, "Nope, haven't explored much at all." He takes the glass Sam offers him.

"Well good night," Sam tells him, and his eyes catch and linger as Dean smiles up at him like he doesn't have a care in the world.

"Goodnight, Sam."

Sam pauses to watch him get comfortable on the couch, and then shakes his head. He's been stupid, he realizes, jumping to conclusions after a lifetime of jumping at shadows. All is well. Dean is safe in his apartment, the killer is somewhere out there and not either of their problems. Sam's mind is finally at ease.

 

 

 

Sam sleeps well into the afternoon, and wakes with a strange feeling of wellbeing. He goes to the living room to find Dean is drinking coffee, still on the couch like he's also just woken up.

They the day in a strange sort of understanding, but of what Sam doesn't know. After ordering breakfast burritos for delivery — "You've never ordered breakfast? Then you haven't _lived_. — they retire to the couch where they watch a Greatest Westerns marathon on one of Sam's four channels.

For years Sam has been trying to come to terms with never watching TV with Dean again, but now here they are, only a foot of space between them. Occasionally their knees brush and a spark goes through Sam every time it happens. He has Dean where he needs him, just within sight even when he's not looking. Even without much of what defines him, Dean still fills up the room in a way only he can, and puts Sam at ease.

They continue the marathon until Sam can hear his neighbors return from work. At six thirty, there comes a knock at the door.

Dean starts, and when Sam looks at him Dean's face is pale under the freckles and stubble. "Expecting company?"

"No."

"Not to tell you what to do in your own apartment, but I would be careful if I were you."

"What do you mean?"

"There are plenty of people who'd like to find me," Dean says, grimacing.

Sam goes to the door, with some trepidation. When he peers through the hole, he sighs and pulls the door open.

Jack bursts in carrying a handle of Jack Daniels and a pie. "Where's the birthday boy?" he hollers and then makes way for three other present-toting, balloon-wrangling friends.

Sam groans. "Shit guys, you didn't have to—"

Ray claps him on the shoulder. "Of course we did. Celebrating your old-ass is one of my greatest joys."

"You are seriously two months younger than me," Sam reminds him and lets himself be dragged in for a warm hug.

Abruptly, a silence falls over the room, and Sam sees that they've looked past him. Dean has stood up fromt he couch.

He's in another of Sam's rumpled t-shirts, artistically ripped jeans, and socked feet. He rubs a hand over his neck, and smiles at them all. "I didn't realize it was your birthday, man. I can go."

Sam shakes his head. "Naw, join us." 

"Holy—" says Tara, distractedly shoving a six pack of beer into Sam's arms. "Is that really—"

"Shut up," Lily whispers.

"Yep, it's me," Dean says.

Sam ushers everyone in. "Guys, stop being weird."

The six of them crowd around Sam's coffee table, cross-legged. The balloons have been let loose to drift awkwardly around the room.

The silence is horrible at first. Tara and Lily are obviously mortified, and Ray won't even look Sam's way. Jack makes some small talk that Sam takes part in wholeheartedly, but the conversation falls flat.

But then Dean opens one of the pizza boxes and puts two giant pieces onto Sam's paper plate, saying, "Happy birthday, princess."

The smattering of laughter breaks the mood. Jack turns on low music, and everyone starts eating.

"So…" Ray motions between the two of them. "How did this—?"

"I was avoiding reporters," Dean says. "So I ducked into Sam's bookstore."

"And then you took him home," Tara finishes, giving Sam a strangely accusatory look.

"Sort of," Dean says. "First I beat up a few teenagers. But yeah, the rest is pretty much history."

"Long story," Sam tells them.

The second Dean goes to the bathroom his friends are on him.

"What the ever loving fuck?" Lily hisses.

"Are you the reason for the most talked about breakup on the internet? Are you the secret paramor the tabloids have been talking about?"

"No," Sam says. "It was completely unrelated. Also I didn't know he had a boyfriend until last night. And also," he finishes, making the most important point. "We're not together."

"Oh please," Tara says. Then, "And how have you lived through this era of Dean Smith's rise to stardom without knowing he was dating Alec frikken Baldwin?"

"Did everyone know?"

Lily gives him a look, and puts a beer in front of him. "They've been the scandal of the last five years."

Sam frowns.

"'Alec Baldwin finally parades out of the closet,'" Jack quotes.

"There's been a headline once a week at least about Dean Smith being shtupped by a man twice his age," Lily offers.

"Ugh," Sam says.

Ray puts a hand on his knee. "I'm sorry."

"It's not like that," Sam says. "I mean, I barely know the guy." He stumbles over the words. "And it's...like I said, it's not like that. I didn't even know Dean was an actor...I mean, didn't even know about Dean Smith until a few months ago."

Sam can't even begin to explain the reasons, obviously. Letting his frankly very awesome friends know that their man-crush Dean Smith is Sam's amnesiatic brother is not something Sam feels up to right now.

Ray puts an arm around him, not unkindly. "This is all on you, you know. You really should keep up with celebrity gossip rags."

Sam agrees with him. "I always wondered if I was missing out on something important."

"Now you don't have to wonder."

There's a beer waiting for Dean when he takes his seat again. "So, Dean," Jack says. "You're going to have to bear with us while we continue our longstanding holiday tradition."

"Oh yeah? What's that?"

"Well, at every major event — birthdays, holidays, et cetera — we give thanks for the good things we have in our life. We do so by keeping ourselves grounded—"

"—so we talk about how much our lives suck," Tara says. "Who's going first tonight?"

"I'll start," Lily says.

Jack nods. "Right, give it your best shot."

She waves to Dean. "Hello, I'm Lily. And my life sucks. I'm thirty-two, single as can be, haven't had a good hook up in six months. And I still work at a bar after five years, which I told myself I would never do in the first place. But it's the only thing I can find that will pay the bills. So. Yeah. That's where I'm at. Beat that."

"Sam's thirty-five," Dean points out. "Way to make him feel bad about his age."

"Speaking of me," Sam says over him. "Nice try, Lily. I work at a bookstore, but unlike you, I make absolutely no tips whatsover." He pauses. "Although the bookstore part is actually pretty great. It's been my backup career choice for years, so scratch that. It's not that abd. Uh," he tries to think of something to continue with that's not about his real life, but his fake normal life is actually pretty great.

"Wow, you suck at this," Jack cuts him off. "My turn. Well, I'm ugly, for one." He points to his mullet. "Got this horrible haircut that doesn't help. And...I got fired today." He waves away the responses and sympathy from around the table. "Oh, it's all right. I wasn't good at my job anyway. I'm looking forward to trying the unemployed thing for a while, take up harmonica."

"You're very musical," Lily says.

Sam points. "Ray?"

Ray clears his throat. "Well, my car wouldn't start yesterday, so I had to shell out for a taxi to get my groceries home. A client yelled at me on the phone today for an hour, and then I had a super uncomfortable interaction on the bus. The bus which I had to take in the first place due to aforementioned car troubles. Also I hang out with total losers. Woe is me."

His eyes crinkle up at the corners at the protest that follows. 

"No, you guys are great." He puts his hand on Sam's knee. "Especially this guy right here. It's hard associating with smart, supermodel types. Really makes you feel your inadequacies."

"I apologize from the bottom of my heart," Sam tells him.

"Happy birthday."

After Tara goes, Jack waves his hand. "Ok, I'm calling it. I think I won this one."

Dean stops with the bottle to his lips. "Hey, what about me?"

They all laughs, then seeing that Dean seems serious, Tara says, "Really...you."

"No way," Ray says. "You don't get a turn."

Dean looks pretty sure of himself when he says, "No, I think I can top all of yours."

Ray shakes his head. "Classic superstar, think the world revolves around you."

"Fine, fine," says Sam. "Give it a try."

"See, this is exactly the problem," Dean tells all of them. "So I'm rich, right?"

There are groans of annoyance, but Dean holds up a hand.

"Right. So that part's not so bad. I'm rich and I've made it." He does air quotes, then continues on despite the sighs of disgust. "I love my job, love acting, but I hate everything that comes with it. I've been threatened. I've been stalked more times than I can count, photographed at every attempt I make to go out in public. And by now you guys probably have heard about the porno."

Jack chokes on beer and Lily nods, a little too enthusiastically for Sam's liking.

Dean shakes his head. "I just want a cup of damn coffee without people pointing and screaming. Is that too much to ask? I'm surrounded by people who love me for my money, my fame, and I never know if my friends just hang around because of my fame or because of my money. It's definitely not my shining personality. Oh yeah, because I have amnesia."

Silence falls. Sam guesses this wasn't common knowledge.

"I can't even remember my life before two years ago," Dean says. "I just know it was something...strange. Bad maybe. There's this feeling of...foreboding. I'm worried I'm going to find out soon and it's not going to be good." When he stops for breath he seems at a loss how to continue. "And...yeah. That's it I guess. That's me."

Silence has descended. They all look to Sam as if wondering what they should say, but Sam has no clue.

"Nah," Ray says after a beat. "Jack still wins."

Tara slaps him on the back. "Good job, you suck more than all of us combined."

"Thank you for this dubious honor," Jack tells them all, holding his beer up as a toast. "To me!"

Sam knocks against Dean's shoulder. "Nice try, man."

Dean smiles. "Yeah, yeah." Sam thinks Dean seems more relaxed as he grabs another slice of cheese and mushroom.

The toasts turn into birthday speeches and too much pie, and the night goes on.

His friends leave at midnight, with a few whispered encouragements that Sam ignores, and a somewhat bittersweet hug from Ray that makes Sam feel like the biggest asshole this side of the US.

"Well, that was fun," Dean says as the door closes, leaving them alone.

"I'm glad you thought so. They're good people."

He crumples wrapping paper into the trash, and beer cans into the recycling. He asks, casually as he can, "Are you staying?"

"Do you mind? I can't really face people right now."

The admission is emotionally honest, too much for Sam right now. "I'll grab you a blanket," he says in response.

 

 

 

 

Knowing his brother is asleep in the next room quells the nightmares, and Sam sleeps undisturbed for three solid hours, waking from a dream that Dean's come to live with him forever. 

He creeps into the living room just to confirm that it's true, at least for the time being. He can just make out the familiar shape of Dean on the sofa. There's Dean's arm under a pillow and the other hanging off onto the floor. He can hear a quiet snoring.

Sam closes his door softly and sits at the edge of his bed.

There's no creak of floorboards. Sam is alone here, with no one but himself. His roommate is gone. Dean is dead asleep on the sofa, seeing Sam only in dreams, and Sam doesn't need to know the contents of the video. Any national scandal is miles away from their reality, but it doesn't change the fact that he's been thinking about it all night.

That's an argument to leave this secret stone unturned. But also Sam needs to know the full details in order to help Dean out.

It's a pitiful excuse that he knows doesn't hold any water, but it's the headline that pushes him over the edge. _Dean Smith, gay rodeo star_ and other links on a similar vein.

He reads: _An angel in the streets, cowboy in the sheets, Smith's early work circa 2016 surfaced early yesterday morning, after an anonymous source claimed to have 'the romance blockbuster America has been waiting for'. News sources expected it to be the leaked footage of Smith's recently shot film, now in post-production, so were understandably scandalized to find a western romance more befitting x-rated porn browser searchthesmeg.com..._

Sam's hand is in a fist on his leg, whether in anger or anticipation he couldn't say. His cursor hovers over the link to the video.

"No." He shakes his head even though he's alone in the room, saying aloud, "No, don't do it. You're going to hate yourself in about a minute."

A better man would resist. But Sam has always been quick fire, all-emotion when it comes to his brother, and he is no better man.

He bites his lip and clicks the link to the video.

It's set in a barn, and Sam can already see what's coming when the camera pans to the bed of hay strewn across the dirt floor. Milk pails are stacked in one corner and a shiny tractor sits, obviously never used, in the other. A raven-haired farmhand grunts theatrically as he tosses bales of the same hay with a pitchfork. 

"It's mighty hot in here," he says, and strips off his shirt to wipe his dewy forehead. He runs a hand sensually down his chest.

"I'll show you hot," drawls a familiar voice, causing Sam's mouth to go dry.

Porn music starts up. Sam should have expected the cowboy hat. The assless chaps make sense but are nonetheless surprising, and the open white suede vest is ridiculous. 

Dean advances on the farmhand, making a few more choice puns about the heat and getting a workout.

The guy may respond with something along the lines of "take me now, farmer Joe" before falling back into the piles of hay.

It's mortifying, which is a relief to realize. Ignoring the fact that Sam has thought about this his whole life, he's glad he's somewhat normal. It _should_ be hard to watch Dean get hot and heavy with someone. 

He can't decide whether to look away as Dean shrugs out of his vest and kneels over the guy. Sam almost closes his computer right then and there, but he finds he can't move his hands from where they're spread on his thighs. 

There is tongue action and a lot of grinding going on that blurs before Sam's wide eyes, and he nearly bites through his lip at the buttplug stuff. Sam's not at all squeamish, but it happens a bit too quickly for his comfort.

At least Dean is still clothed from the waist down, while the other guy is completely bare-ass naked. He thinks the farmhand might be moaning for real now. It sounds less faked as the plug continues to be applied to multiple orifices.

Sam squeaks when Dean reaches in his own leathers to grab his junk.

The other man moans in a wanton manner and spreads his legs, and Dean licks his lips like he's hungry for it.

"I bring out the whip next."

Sam jerks upright from how he's been slouching in toward the computer to watch. "Shit! Shit, uh, Dean—"

Dean, the real Dean, has let himself into Sam's room and is leaning, arms crossed, against the door frame. How long he's been watching Sam watch him, Sam doesn't know.

Dean nods to the laptop. "In about five minutes—" He steps further into the room, clicking the door gingerly closed behind him. "—after he shoots his load from just that plug, that's when I pull out the whip."

"Uh. I'm so— So sorry. I mean, obviously I am." Sam's face is burning. He's miserable.

Dean only shrugs, and sits at the edge of Sam's bed, his knee pressing Sam's. "I argued it wasn't very cowboy-accurate, but when I got into it it was kind of fun."

"Dean—"

Dean shakes his head. "I've always liked cowboys, or at least I think I have."

They watch in silence video keeps planing. The whip makes an appearance, as promised, but Sam exits out of the window when Dean starts using it.

The silence that falls is very fraught. On his part, not Dean's. Sam is a horrible person, they both now know it.

Sam shuts the laptop, casting them in darkness and he thinks he can imagine what comes next. But the anticipation is killing him.

Dean's hand drops heavy on Sam's knee and Sam shivers, his entire body thrilling at the touch.

"You know," says Dean, near and close in the dark. "Normally invasion of privacy is something I frown upon. But for some reason I'm finding this instance impressively hot."

"You're going to hate me later," Sam tells them both.

Dean's mouth finds his easily, like it was meant to. He feels like Sam has always imagined, hot and sturdy. His hands are soft on Sam's arms, hair rough then soft as Sam ruins the styling. His knee is jammed against Dean's until he lies back onto the small matress and drags Dean down with him. 

Things go quickly, Dean Smith is not fond of foreplay. Rough making out turns into Sam moaning against him, as Dean slides a hand between them, taking control.

All the terrible things they've done in the dark together, and now this. It feels like goodbye.

 

 

 

Sam is surprised to find Dean still in his bed in the morning, unreal in the golden light. His bare skin is lined unevenly by a hundred barely-there silvery scars.

There's a pain in Sam's chest where he thinks his heart used to be. He knows what it's like to wake up like Dean must have, memory washed clean and body telling a story he can't read. And it will have to stay that way. When it's safe for Dean to leave today, or maybe tomorrow, Sam will let him go. This time for good. Sam will never make peace with losing his brother, but he's learning to accept it every day.

Dean's eyes flutter open, guileless and untroubled. "Morning, sunshine."

It's somewhat sarcastic and perfect and Dean's such an unsettling shade of himself that Sam has to look away. This was never his, and it's not his now, either.

Dean seems to sense the mood. He presses Sam away with a hand on his chest as he sits up. "This calls for caffeine," he says. "You have coffee, right?" 

"That's the one thing I do have, yes," Sam tells him, and watches without hiding as Dean pulls on a pair of Sam's boxers, upsetting their perfectly folded pile.

Sam follows soon after. The domestic sight that greets him makes him smile. Leaning into the fridge, Dean is humming something Sam can't recognize. When he emerges, with the milk, he pours a splash into his own and passes Sam his coffee without.

Sam takes it. "Thanks. How'd you know I don't drink milk in my coffee?"

"Just had a feeling."

They sip in silence, but it's not an uncomfortable one. Sam admires the way Dean's eyes flutter closed as he enjoys his drink, and asks finally, "So what's your plan?"

Dean puts his mug down. "I think it's safe to head out today. Two days, and no one's found me. We only have one more week of filming in the city, and I have something else to take care of tonight. But yeah. That's pretty much it. After that I'll head back to LA."

One week. Sam will have to steer clear for that long and then his problem will work itself out. "So where are you filming. Maybe I could drive you?"

Dean's smile is real and Sam's glad he's offered. "Mariner's Park," says Dean. "Down by the river. That would be great."

Sam freezes with his mug halfway to his mouth, stuck on a vague thought he can't pinpoint. Dean takes another sip of coffee then goes to check out the contents of Sam's fridge again. 

_Mariner's Park. Down by the river._

Sam flashes to the most recent headline, the murder by the lighthouse. Mariner's park.

_I have something else to take care of tonight._

"I have to uh," he says, stepping away from the counter. "Get the paper."

"Let me brush my teeth before we go," says Dean, and Sam watches him enter the bathroom before rubbing his hands over his face.

He's distracted by these thoughts, trying to make sense of them, as he puts his hand on the doorknob. He is barefoot and completely unprepared for what is about to happen next. He opens the door and is greeted by a wall of noise and a million flashing lights.

The front stoop and the sidewalk beyond is a throng of reporters. A microphone is shoved into his face, "Are you harboring porn star Dean Smith—"

Sam's reflexes are quick, and he jumps back inside and slams the door in seconds. It's too late however — he knows the photographers have snapped at least a dozen pictures.

But Dean's presence hasn't been confirmed. He'll have to sneak Dean out the back window and climb him up to the roof to hide out until the chaos ends.

He has a hand on the wall, staring blankly about how long reporters are allowed to camp out on the street, when he feels Dean's arms snake around him to wrap around his middle.

"Dude, chill out," Dean says. His voice is warm, nothing short of fond. "It's just me."

"Dean, it's not safe here." Sam says. He's aware he's going into full flight-mode in his need to save Dean from near and present danger.

"What are you talking about?"

"I just wanted to get the paper," says Sam. "But—"

"Ok, chill out, go make us toast." Dean steps around Sam. "I'll grab the paper for you."

Sam reaches out in what feels like slow motion. "Don't—"

Then he's blinded again by a million flashbulbs, stood just inside the door barely anything, his hand around Dean's bicep while what looks like all of Detroit's news media is writhing on his doorstep, shoving in to take Dean away.

"Close the door!"

Dean shoves him back and slams the door. Instantly he begins pacing, hands rubbing over his face. "Great. Just— great."

"Dean. I'm sorry."

"Sorry about what exactly?" He turns on Sam, a horrible expression twisting his features. "So what happened? Call around when I was asleep? Let them know you had mutually beneficial handjobs with Dean Smith? How much did they offer you?"

Sam stares at him, gaping. "I swear it's not like that."

"Well, joke's on me for thinking you were different. Trusting my instinct."

Sam tries to put a hand on his shoulder, to stop Dean's frantic movements, but Dean steps out of reach. "Your instinct was right," Sam tries to assure him. "I had no idea—"

The static of reporters grows into a roar, and he turns in time to see that Greg has pulled the door open and is posing for the photographers, yellowed tighty-whities just barely covering his ass. Dean leaves the room.

"Greg, close that!"

Sam can hear Dean talking quickly to someone on his phone, his tone conveying barely controlled anger. He emerges from Sam's bedroom just moments later, fully dressed.

"Driver is coming here to pick me up," he says. "What are you looking for? Fame? You know, you could have just made a sex tape if you wanted to really dig in the knife."

Sam follows him to the door. "What about driving you to set—"

"I don't need your help."

Dean yanks the door open for the fourth time now, and again the scene is one of unearthly light, too bright for human eyes. Dean doesn't look back, only says to himself, "Jesus, this is a PR nightmare," and steps out into the blinding sea.

The throng swallows him from sight. Sam stares for a moment, but when an intrepid reporter shoves a camera inside, he slams the door shut. The camera lies broken at Sam's feet, and he doesn't open the door to return it despite the hard knocking that goes on forever. Sam ignores it all and numbly stares at the grain of the door.

Greg is eating a banana now, scratching his happy trail, a somewhat bored expression at odds with the current events. "You ok, bro?"

"No," Sam snaps. "I'm not ok."

Greg considers this for a moment, then lays the banana peel on the counter. "Want me to chase after him for you? I did track in high school."

Sam rakes his fingers through his hair. "I don't understand. How did they find him? Did they follow him?"

"It seems likely."

"Wait, was it you?"

"How could you ask me that?" Greg looks deeply offended. "I support your relationship one-hundred percent. In fact, I was so happy you were finally dating, I told all my friends down at the bar all about it— oh."

"Seriously? Great."

"I mean, I didn't tell them specifically who you were effing, so there's no way— although I may have mentioned he was a porn star. But I didn't name any names! And they would never tell anyone."

"Well apparently they would." Sam stalks to the coffee table and drinks half Dean's beer from last night, his throat dry. He puts it down again where it fizzes out.

"Sorry, man. I really am."

"Don't worry about it, Greg. I have bigger problems right now."

"What could be bigger than your true love walking out of your life forever?" He gives Sam a sympathetic frown that's somewhat ruined when he says. "Is it syphilis?"

"No," Sam says, feeling an eerie calm settle over his mind. "I'll have to track him down without alerting him to my presence. Which will be easy enough. I have ways of finding out where he is."

Greg shakes his head. "Love makes man crazy," he says in profound tones, as if it excuses all manner of creepiness.

Unfortunately in this case, he happens to be right.

Sam turns on his computer and pulls up a tracking page where he can see a blinking light moving steadily away from his apartment. It's a good thing he thought to turn on Dean's GPS.

Things are going to go badly, he can feel it. But he has no choice now.

"There are things I have to do," he says, and gets to work.

 

 

 

The blinking light stays firmly in Mariner's Park where Dean is filming for the entire afternoon. Sam hopes this means that this is all a big coincidence, that Dean has not become a ruthless killer. But the more pragmatic side of his brain reminds him that the murders have always happened at night, and that serial killers rarely deviate from their plan. Dean himself said he would wait until nighttime.

Dean may be an experience serial killer, but Sam is a sometimes-unhinged hunter of monsters. Sam thinks he won't have any problem stopping one, weak human from making a bad decision.

These dark plans set in motion, Sam readies himself for the task ahead. He removes herbs from the box in his closet, along with the spray paint, a knife, and a lighter, then goes to settle on the couch to stare at the tracking page.

Good things come to those who wait, of course. As he'd suspected, just past midnight, the dot comes to life. 

"Gotcha," he says as Dean's red dot blinks like a target.

Dean is in a car, moving again along the city streets, toward the waterfront. Sam drives down silent streets, and eventually crosses just behind Dean's taxi. They're not heading toward Mariner's Park. But they wouldn't, would they? If Dean has played a part in these murders, then he wouldn't return to the scene of a previous crime.

Sure enough, Dean is dropped off instead near a shipping yard. Sam kills the headlights and cruises silently to park down a ways, out of the halo of street lamps. When he jogs back to where Dean had been dropped off, he's worried he's lost him at this critical moment but then catches sight of him rounding a pile of crates a ways ahead. 

The reality of this is grim. Sam doesn't want to be here, following his brother. Dean cuts a familiar silhouette as he goes silently, slim and unassuming, the asphalt gleaming wet with recent rain. 

He follows nonetheless, at a safe distance, finding it easy to slip into the shadows of the crates.  
Tailinga suspected killer is like slipping on a pair of old boots — the movements second-nature, worn with familiarity. Chagrin colors his smile as he imagines what Dean might have to say about this, something about the hunter becoming the hunted.

Sam ducks around a crate when Dean stops by a low bungalow up ahead. He seems to be watching the door of the bungalow, probably a one-roomed office, where a light still shines even at this hour. As they wait, a rat scurries by and the smell of mildewed wood tells him water is not far off.

A shiver runs through Sam, seeing Dean like this. He wonders if Dean has been playing him all along. He doubts he's that good an actor. If what Sam suspects is true, well...he refuses to believe Dean is beyond saving, but it won't be good. 

They wait there a long time, him and Dean. It's two a.m. when the light in the window switches off, and he has to subtly stretch the kinks from his back,which has grown stiff with cold.

Moments later, the door to the office bangs open. It becomes clear this is the man Dean has been waiting for when Dean leans forward where he's hiding. It's subtle and chilling to see. 

Dean then recedes and heads back the way he came, passing Sam's position without noticing him. Sam looks to the man leaving the office, alone tonight, and checking his watch and his pockets for his keys. Sam looks the way Dean left and decides that it's more pertinent to keep his eyes on his wayward brother than on the prey itself.

He takes off at a jog, through the shadows, checking around the corner where he catches sight of Dean slipping off.

He speeds up his pace, and turns another corner, the only way Dean could have gone, and it's a dead end of crates stacked impossibly high, too high to be climbed. There are no fences to scale or windows to go through, just the tall walls.

"Shit."

Sam sprints back the way he came, but it's too late.

Dean has the man by the hair in the moonlight. It's too careless. Dean must know Sam is here, or that someone is here at least. 

Sam isn't going to make it in time, he is too far away still. Dean takes out a knife and runs it through the man, cutting off his pleas.

"Dean!"

It's one thing to suspect that Dean is responsible for the murders, it's another thing to watch it happen.

The man crumples to the ground and lays still. Like a scene from a play Sam makes it just in time to see the life flutter in his chest, to see Dean wipe the knife on his sleeve, repocket it, and take off almost casually into the shadows.

Sam leaves the man sputtering on the wet ground and goes after Dean. He cries out when he's grabbed from behind and manhandled up against the wall, face shoved against the metal.

"I didn't want to have to do this." Sam shivers as Dean's voice blows hot in his ear. "I like you, Sam. I really do." He struggles but Dean has the knife tip pressed against his side, up under his shirt, still slick with another man's blood.

"Struggle all you want," Dean says. "But there's no way I can let you go now." And it might be wishful thinking on Sam's part, but he thinks he hears some remorse in the tone.

"How many?" Sam asks. "How many innocent people have you killed?"

He doesn't think Dean is going to answer.

"Tonight was the tenth," says Dean.

Sam goes limp. "Dean," he says. "Why?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"Please try to explain."

"I can't help it. I just need to. There's something wrong with them. Something about their eyes."

Sam starts to laugh. He can feel the moment Dean's grip on him slackens in confusion, and he easily turns the tables. He has Dean up against the wall in no time, a rope from a wooden box cut with the knife he was just being threatened with, and wound firmly around Dean's hands. He presses Dean's face into the wall when Dean starts to yell.

"Shh, do you really want cops here?" Dean shivers as Sam's mouth touches his ear. "Don't you worry, brother, I'm going to fix this. It'll all be ok."

Dean struggles. "Who the hell even are you?"

 _Your worst nightmare_ , might actually apply here, but Sam is not in the mood for jokes. He pulls Dean to the ground, and binds Dean's legs as well. The ropes are tight. A little bit tighter still and they'd do some real damage. 

Sam rips a rag off his shirt and uses it to gag Dean, ignoring the way Dean struggles.

He removes the paint from his pocket. It's only a quarter full now. He shakes it and sprays the square trap design and symbols on the asphalt, and drops a flame into the pile of herbs.

He can tell Dean is watching this carefully. "I'm going to fix this," Sam repeats, and stands back. " _Messorum evoco qui me tetigit._ "

Nothing happens.

" _Messorum evoco qui me tetigit,_ " he tries again, more clearly this time. " _O theris tes, caleo se cai deo._ "

He coughs, inhaling some of the herb smoke.

But Billie doesn't appear. He tries a third time to no avail.

Sam doesn't have a backup plan. He looks to Dean who has the gall to look back at Sam like he thinks _he's_ the crazy one.

_Don't summon me again unless you have a very good reason._

His heart sinks. He knows what he has to do. But he can't, not just yet. He needs a few more moments.

He sits next to Dean on the cold ground and reaches out to touch his hair. Dean makes a noise of outrage and Sam tries to ignore the despair that wells up in him.

"Doing this, tying you up and trying to call a reaper," he tells Dean. "This was my last resort. I would have let you live your life. I was going to leave you alone."

Dean struggles, whining through the gag.

"Jesus, Dean, how did it come to this? I was going to let you have happiness." He can feel goosebumps prickling up Dean's neck where his fingers stroke. "I'm not going to kill you. It's something arguably worse."

He laughs, aware that he sounds like a bad guy at the end of a cheesy movie. The laughter startles Dean, and makes him struggle harder.

"You're going to hate yourself for this, but it's for your own good," Sam tells him. "After everything, after all the stupid, terrible things we've gone through, this is by far the worst thing I've ever had to do. You were _happy_ ," his voice is raising in pitch, unable to help it. "You deserved it Dean. You, above all people, deserve it. But now I have to take it away." He grabs Dean by the hair, like he'd seen Dean do to that innocent man outside moments before he'd slaughtered him. "What would ever possess you to— why would you do this to me? But it doesn't matter anymore."

He stands, abruptly dropping Dean's body to the floor.

"I'll miss you so much," he tells him. "You'll understand later why I had to do this."

He stands within the bounds of the reaper trap and looks Dean over, where Dean is watching him like he's insane. Which to any normal person, Sam probably is. 

Sam takes his phone from his jacket, and presses play on the summoning recording he's prepared. He then removes the knife from his jacket then, and, trying not to think about it, stabs himself in the stomach.

Through the unimaginable pain, he thinks he hears Dean cry out. As he collapses to the floor next to him, Sam manages to stay in the trap.

He closes his eyes and hopes for the best.

He has a sense of floating away from all earthly pain, which is technically a bad sign, and what might be only a moment later he finds himself able to sit up straight from where he's slumped over and dying. There are two of him now, his body on the ground and his spirit form standing now, watching the scene. He turns to look at Dean, whose jaw is tight, eyes on Sam's prone form.

So this is what it's like to be on the edge of death, he thinks. The other times this has happened he must have blocked out.

Abruptly, they're no longer alone. Dean lets out a grunt of surprise when Billie blinks into existence right before his eyes.

She looks at Sam. "Interesting. Hello, Sam."

Dean makes a noise around the gag but Billie pays him no attention.

Sam steps toward her. "You need to take it down," he says. "The wall in Dean's head. You have to do it. He's killing people."

She smiles. "Reapers don't bow to the will of humans," she says, but he thinks it sounds more like a reminder than a threat. "Although this scene is rather touching."

Sam holds his ground. "You've said before that you want us dead," he says, and spreads his arms. "Well now you have me."

"A bargain? His life for yours?"

"Yes." Sam stands his ground. "I've made a deal with the devil. I'm ready for whatever comes next."

"I didn't come for you." Billie turns to look to the dead man.

"Oh god," Sam says, remembering.

Billie takes a step toward the body, but then stops and looks to the ground where she's toeing the line of wet paint. "Let me out of this."

"And you'll save him?"

"We'll see."

Sam can tell it's as much as he is going to get.

"How?" he asks, and Billie sighs.

"Dean," she says, and looks to where Dean is silent in shock and confusion. His eyes are on her, tracking her movements. "Come to me and I'll let you free."

Surprisingly it works, and Dean begins rolling toward her. Of course he believes her. To him she's just a beautiful woman and can't remember the million reasons why he should be cautious. As she directs him to wipe the paint away to clear a path, Sam looks back to the body lying crumpled where Dean had stabbed him.

There's no other spirit, Sam realizes. Which means the man is still alive. Billie must be waiting.

Sam falls to his knees where the blood has pooled out. The man is completely still. Sam's hands pass through his neck when he tries to find a pulse, but the eyes crack open a sliver. "It's gone now," he rasps. "Oh thank God, it's gone."

Sam sees now that the wound was left of center, Dean had thrust the knife into the guy's side. Sam wishes he could call for an ambulance, or at the very least press a hand over the wound. There's still hope to save him. "Please, please don't die. Stay with me, man."

"It's gone."

Sam can feel Billie behind him, out of the trap now, a cool presence. "What does that mean?"

"Not everything is as it appears," she tells him. Every word touches him like comfort, inviting him to follow.

Samm ignores the urge, trying again to get the man's attention. "What do you mean, gone?"

Of course the guy can't see him, let alone hear anything save the drip of Sam's blood on the pavement nearby. 

"I never thought it would leave." The guy breaks into a fit of coughing, but manages to turn his head to look at Dean, who is on his side still, silent. "It was there forever. Inside me, a devil force. Thank you, sir. _Thank you_."

Sam looks back to Billie. "A demon? Was this man possessed?"

Billie inclines her head. "It appears Dean was doing God's work even without realizing it. It's funny the way these things work out."

The relief that shudders through Sam's incorporeal self is overwhelming. "You'll take care of him?" he asks.

"I don't make deals with humans," she says again.

"Right."

Sam goes to Dean, who he sees is trying to secretly get the knots of his ropes untied. Sam gives it two hours, tops.

"I gotta go," he tells him. "You're gonna be alright."

Dean continues pulling at the ropes while Billie's back is turned, and can't see Sam leaning over him.

"I love you." Even though Dean won't be able to hear him, he feels better having said it.

"It's time," Billie says, the spirit of the man waiting at her side.

"Ok."

Sam goes to her. He takes deep breaths that don't reach his lungs, and thinks that he's had a good life, in ways. He holds onto the image of his friends, and Dean, who just last night were laughing around the table as Sam blew out the candles on his birthday pie. Make a fucking wish, Sammy.

Dean is the last thing he sees before he closes his eyes.

 

 

 

There is good news and there is bad news.

The first noise Sam hears when he wakes up is the rev of an engine just outside the window. When he inhales deep against the pillow, the rich cedar of men's aftershave fills his nose. He thinks, hell sounds and smells curiously like a motel room inhabited by his brother.

Or maybe it's heaven. When Sam blinks awake he finds he is lying spread eagle and drooling on a violently orange motel bedspread, like he's been dropped there.

He swings his bare feet to the grimy carpet and takes a look at the pamphlets on the bedside table. Well, he's still in Detroit. The flyer welcoming visitors to Motown, automobile capital of the world, makes that clear.

A perfunctory sweep of the room reveals that he's alone. How he got here, he doesn't know, but he doubts it was Billie.

Which means it was Dean. He probably left him here to die after witnessing how crazy Sam is and what kind of powerful friends he keeps. Or maybe it was out of some sense of guilt he couldn't remember the root of.

Sam stops at the mirror and examines his reflection. 

"I don't feel dead," he says, and his stubbled, bruised double agrees. He lifts his shirt to ascertain that he did actually stab himself, that it wasn't all a dream. There's no pain when he moves except for a vague feeling, but there's a mark. It's small and pinked, and he wonders why Billie cured him. Or rather, what possessed her to do it.

Sam allows himself a small smile at that. A part of him is disappointed, because if he's survived this, it means the wall in Dean's head is still in place. But if he's honest, he's mostly relieved. He'll have to tell Dean himself, now that Dean has proven himself to be a public hazard. He'll lock him up if he has to, and he'll cure him. Somehow.

A shower makes Sam feel less like the walking dead, and when he puts his jacket back on he finds a scrap of paper in the pocket, torn from hotel stationery. It reads simply, _I'm on set._ , followed by the address.

 

 

 

 

Sam can see Dean from far off, standing on the cobbled walk near a fountain. The university is being used to film some sort of 16th century movie, judging by the large, Shakespearean ruff Dean has wound around his neck. He manages to look dashing in spite of it.

When Sam spots him, he has his hands on his hips, staring into the middle distance while lighting and camera guys make adjustments to the scene. A woman in a pink gown and garish wig yawns next to him behind her prop fan.

Unfortunately, Sam is intercepted on his way over by a man with a headset and a decent amount of muscles. "I'm sorry, only staff past this point," he says, subtly flexing in Sam's path.

Sam tries to look nonthreatening. "I'm actually just here to see—"

"Are you on the list?"

"Well no," Sam admits. "I'm actually here to see Dean. Dean Smith?"

The man's eyes are unreadable.

Sam tries again. "The actor?"

"Yeah, I know who Dean Smith is."

"Great. I'm actually an old—friend, so it's fine. I'm sure he'll be happy to see me." Maybe a little white lie, but. "I'll just wait over—"

"Friend? Ha. You and everyone else here. If you're not on the list, I can't let you in."

Sam cranes his neck to see past. Dean, who is looking around set bored, spots him, and Sam can see the moment of recognition. Sam raises his hand but he's blocked again by the muscle.

"Sir, I don't want to ask you again—"

"Oh come on."

A woman with a clipboard near them turns. "Stu, let him stay. Mr. Smith let me know over the comm that this guy is cool."

Sam can read Stu's hesitation in his frown.

She steps forward. "Said he was an old stalker that he's grown fond of. That we should let him hang out."

Stu lets Sam go, face going disinterested now that his job is over. "His funeral," he mutters and moves on to the next security breach.

The woman pulls up a folding chair for Sam. She offers him a headset. "Want to listen in? Set's pretty boring unless you know what's going on."

"Sure, thanks." Sam takes a seat.

He adjusts the headset to fit his head and relaxes back, eyes trained on Dean who is getting on his mark with the woman in the wig. The parasol she's holding shields them a bit from view, but as Sam adjusts the volume on his headset, their voices crackle into focus.

"—can't wait to get out of this codpiece," says Dean's voice. "Chafes my junk."

Sam rolls his eyes. Despite losing nearly his entire identity, he's still the same Dean.

The woman titters a laugh. "Charming. And speaking of charming, who was that tall drink of water you were checking out."

"Oh. That was just...Sam."

"Do tell."

"He's my brother."

Sam stares.

The woman sounds interested. "Why Smith, I didn't know you had a brother."

"You know me, man of mystery." Dean's tone is heavily sarcastic.

Sam's mind is reeling. If Dean knows him, really _knows_ him, then that can mean only one thing.

"That's sweet he comes to watch you film," he hears over the headset.

"Yeah, that's Sam for you. He's always been my number one fan."

Sam has only just gotten there, and he knows it's stupid to let Dean out of his sight in light of this new information, but he's not feeling too logical right now. He stands and removes the headset.

The woman looks up distractedly from her phone. "Not staying?"

"Thanks, I've heard enough," he tells her and leaves set behind.

 

 

 

There's no where Sam can go, he has to return to the motel. His curiosity won't let him return to his apartment, and his fear for Dean, his need to be with him, his understanding of how Dean must be feeling, means he has to be there for him, even if Dean has every grounds to hate him forever. Dean can't be alone, like he has been for years.

The waiting ends at seven, when Sam's been debating whether or not to go get food for them or just fall over onto the bed and sleep forever. Sam's stomach plummets at the scuff of a key in the lock, and then the door swings open.

Dean stands in the doorway, and what's distracting Sam is the giant, bushy beard he has suddenly grown.

Sam blinks at him. "Wow."

Dean closes the door, then seems to remember himself and peels the fake beard off his face. Sam winces in sympathy.

"I'd rather the paparazzi don't get wind of this," he says of the crappy motel.

"Nice disguise." Sam stares at him. "You came back."

"Looks like it." Dean doesn't sit. He goes to put his wallet and keys on the table.

Sam twists his hands in his lap. "So the wall's gone? You have your memory back?"

Dean grunts.

Sam hesitates. "Do you remember...everything?"

"Yeah. I suppose so."

"Look," Sam starts. "I'm really sorry about...you know. The things. That happened."

Dean's face goes pale. He clenches his jaw. "Yeah, you're sorry? Care to clarify what it is you regret?"

He stares Sam down like he's daring him to say it, to name what he did.

Sam may have his moments, but he's brave enough for this one. He stays silent, hanging his head so he doesn't have to look Dean in the face.

"Right," Dean says. Like that's all settled. "Filming wraps at the end of this week. I guess I'll be leaving town after that."

"Ok."

He walks past. Sam falls back on the bed, where he rubs a hand over his eyes and listens to Dean's footfalls recede into the bathroom. He can feel an ache in his side where he'd plunged the knife. 

"Fuck _me_ ," he whispers. He prays maybe the bed will swallow him up already so he can die a quick and quiet death. Dean can keep the royalties from the resulting lawsuit as an apology.

 

 

 

Things get worse.

Or that's what it feels like. Sam wakes the next day as the sun is painting the horizon. Dean's gone already, so he goes for breakfast at a nearby diner, and sends vague glances at his phone until he turns it off and puts it in his pocket. A waitress gives him a look like, _you and me both_ , and gives him extra butter with his toast and calls him sugar.

When Dean walks in without so much as an explanation, Sam doesn't know whether to feel relieved or what. At least it's something.

"Not filming?"

"At eight. Late day."

Sam nods, and opts to just sit quietly and sip his coffee. Dean doesn't look at him but he doesn't get up, either.

After twelve hours like this, Sam is sunk into a deep and unrelenting state of anxiety waiting for Dean to say anything, do anything. He finds himself tensing up every time Dean moves. Every sound could mean Sam's about to be eaten alive. Like when Dean reaches past him for the mustard, and Sam can feel the heat off him as he leans in close. The hairs on his neck stand on end. His senses are on high alert, ready for Dean's heavy hand to fall on his shoulder or punch him.

Instead, Dean flips the bottle over and squeezes the life out of it. Nothing comes out.

A charming smile calls the waitress back over. "Out of mustard," he tells her. "Mind getting me another one?"

She giggles as she leaves them. It doesn't do anything to clear the air. At the end of the meal Sam tips her four soft dollar bills flattened under his empty mug and watches Dean drive away.

 

 

 

On Wednesday morning, two days after Sam nearly died and Dean was reborn, Sam looks up when he's brushing his teeth to find that reflected back at him is Dean.

Dean is well-dressed and on his way to work, golden in the warped mirror as he comes into the bathroom. He hasn't gotten rid of his designer t-shirts, despite how Sam imagines he must feel about his current, fake life.

Their eyes lock briefly in the mirror. Sam pauses brushing.

But Dean's eyes slide away as he shoulders in next to Sam to squirt toothpaste onto his electric toothbrush, and Sam is overcome with the dying need for Dean to either jerk him off against the mirror immediately or, more likely, hit him in the face for all he's worth. Anything to break the tension.

Dean up this close to him, Sam has sudden a sense memory of the night in his small room, the sex felt like some fantasy dream. It's not Sam's to dream about, but he can't hold back the memeory of Dean leaning in closer than he's ever been and the intimate thundering of his own heartbeat in his head. He remembers Dean's arms, how strong they'd been.

While he is reliving this, Sam gives those same arms a furtive glance. Brushing thoroughly, Dean's biceps are bulging so pornographically that Sam chokes on his toothbrush.

"Um," Dean says, turning at the coughing.

There was a time he might have made a deep-throat joke, but now he just stands and watches Sam gag.

When he can finally breathe again, Sam rinses his mouth out, head ducked to drink out of the tap. He straightens to find Dean frowning with a cup in his hand, swishing his mouth out as well. Sam's eyes water as he glances at Dean's arms again, and then he leaves the room. This kind of shit can fuck you up, he reminds himself. He wonders if he'll ever stop thinking about it.

 

 

 

 

At the motel he counts minutes, wondering at the end of each day whether Dean is going to come back at all, just to spend an hour mutely watching TV and then falling asleep in silence. He could book any other room at nicer places than this, all of them without Sam in them, waiting. But Dean keeps coming back. Sam can't understand why.

The words blur on the page in whichever book Sam is working his way through. It's Thursday, which means there's one day before filming ends, before Dean is set to leave. Dean is on the opposite bed, steadfastly ignoring Sam's presence as he memorizes lines from a well-annotated script.

Sam hasn't made any headway. He doesn't deserve Dean's forgiveness, he knows that completely, he doesn't deserve anything from Dean, so he can't push the matter.

If this were his real life, he'd get up and take a drive. He'd come back to the motel with food and flop down onto the second bed and let Dean ramble about cars or guns or the hunt, and lull the awkward out of him, while shitty action movies ran low on TV, real shoot 'em ups that would distract him long enough from the memory of his brother's dick in his hand and Dean's hot breath on his neck.

But in the current reality, Sam can only exist as a silent companion who is there if Dean needs him.

Dean, however, doesn't need him. He doesn't give any indication that he can feel Sam's eyes on him occasionally, let alone Sam's borderline creepy zero'd in awareness of him. He just flips another page, scanning it with a sort of peevish, constipated look on his face.

The words for this situation are impossible to find. Sam taps his fingertips slowly on the page instead. One two three. One two three.

Dean finally sighs and puts down the script. He turns to look at Sam. "Something to say?"

"No," says Sam. "Nothing to say."

Dean makes a face. "No really, Sam. You're being really frigging annoying."

"Well, we could talk," Sam tries. "If you want. How are you feeling? I know things must be hard and—"

"How about when we commited lurid acts in your bed," says Dean. "You say you didn't mean that?"

Sam can't bring himself to say it again. He looks away. And when he hears Dean pick up the script again, he punches his pillow into shape and lies down.

"Good talk," he hears Dean say, flipping a page. "Go to sleep, Sam."

"Shut the hell up," Sam mutters, closing his eyes.

 

 

 

For nearly a week, Sam has waited for the other shoe to drop, most of his time time spent in listless misery. 

At work, on Friday, he flips through magazines at the till and suffers endless daydreams, imagining a reality in which Sam had resisted. Where he hadn't taken advantage and where Dean somehow now wants him back. He imagines things back to the way they were supposed to be. Or, you know, Dean storming in to shove him up against the stacks, papers falling to the floor in flurries and avalanches, and cartoon hearts floating around them.

It's horrible of him to think it. Sam's mouth grows tighter as he reads.

When Sam's shift ends, he can't face the thought of the silence of the motel room, before and after Dean returns. He pulls off the road at a divey establishment with a flashing sign missing a few letters.

The sour smell of beer and smokey patrons is oddly comforting as Sam takes a seat at the bar. Ordering a beer, he rolls his shoulders to loosen the crick in his neck then fixes his eyes on the TV that's playing the fuzz of baseball at low volume. Here he can be no one. A man who has a 9-5 job and hasn't just fucked his brother without permission.

He doesn't look away from the game until someone takes a seat next to him an hour later.

"Ah," Sam says, alarmed to see his brother. And not just because Dean is wearing the fake beard again. "How did you find me?"

"Just buy me a goddamn drink," Dean growls. He sounds angry. 

Sam flags down the bartender, who places glasses on a coasters in front of them. Dean downs his in five swallows and gestures for another. The jukebox plays something old timey, a love song, and Sam looks into his drink.

"Last day of filming," Dean says after a moment of silence. "Got things all wrapped up."

"That's good," Sam says. "Happy to be done?"

"Yeah. Believe it or not, I'm so not into acting."

Sam nods. "Figured."

"Had to remember all those lines, where to stand — all while wearing tights. _Tights_."

Sam wonders how long this friendly conversation is going to last. "Dean," he says, but Dean cuts him off.

"Look, Sam." There is a bend to Dean's laugh. It sounds at the edge of breaking. "This is...really hard for me. Part of me wants to leave, just up and go. But part of me, a selfish part, wants you to be you again."

Sam stares at him. "I'm still me."

Dean turns on his stool. "Really? Because I don't see it that way. I come back, you're employed and living somewhere really _really_ cold, with some weird guy. You have a boyfriend and like, a million other things you've always wanted."

"You were dead," Sam says, unable to control the volume of his voice. "I didn't know where else to go."

The men next to them at the bar have gone silent. The one closest to Sam swirls his chair so that he's facing Sam's way, and tries, "Is there a problem, sir—"

"No, we're fine," Sam says curtly. Some stranger is not going to ruin what might be his last interaction with his brother. The man purses his lips, and turns away. 

Dean's mouth is hanging open. "Dead? Way I remember it, Chuck and Amara had a heart to heart, I was knocked out, and came to right after. I was only out for like, an hour max."

Sam frowns. "You left me to go sacrifce yourself!"

"Point. But if you thought I was dead, then…" he trails off.

"Look, I know I have no right to be upset with you here, but how could you possibly think I didn't…" Sam trails off, a horrible thought occurring to him.

It had happened before, of course. Dean had been gone, suffering through Purgatory, and Sam hadn't gone after him.

He can see that this is the conclusion Dean has rightly come to as well. Sam has given up on him in the past, and it seemed likely to happen again.

"I see how you got that impression," Sam say. "But I tried. I really tried. And when I couldn't find a way to save you, I tried to move on. Not very well admittedly, but...yeah."

"Ok, I need to think," Dean says. He rubs his eyes. 

Sam continues in a lower voice, "And I'm sorry. I know I did some unforgivable things. I know there's no way you'll be able to forgive me, but once I found out you were alive, I just honestly wanted you to be happy. Maybe I made the wrong call letting you live with no memory, but you seemed like you had a better life. It seemed like the right call to make at the time."

They stare at one another, and finally the fight seems to go out of Dean. HIs shoulders slump and he looks away.

"No," says Dean. "You're right. In the same situation, I would have made the same call. I've had a while to think about everything you said to me when I was," he waves a hand at his head. "You know. Memory wiped. And to think about everything you were going to sacrifice for me. I would do the same."

Some of Sam's guilt disippates knowing this.

"So that's why I have to leave," Dean continues.

"What?"

Dean shakes his head. "You have a life, Sam. _Finally_. I'm not going to take that away from you."

Sam reaches out, and places a hand on the bartop between them. "Dean. It's not a life without you in it. Please believe me."

The men next to them get up abruptly and leave. Dean finishes his beer in one gulp.

"Yeah, about that," he says, gingerly placing the glass back on the coaster. "About, uh, what happened."

Sam feels his face heat up, shame and a flash of desire mixed into one. "Again. I'm sorry. That must have been, uh, surprising to say the least."

"Not exactly," Dean says. He seems to be hesitating over his words. "Remember that, memory washed or not, I came onto you. It's not that I don't, obviously, find you, um…"

Sam has never wanted to be in a position of being turned down nicely by his brother. Thankfully, Dean continues.

"I do have some real hang ups. Which is the understatement of the century, I know."

"Of course," says Sam. He's aware they're in a bartering stage, and he's not above begging. "Please let me go with you. I promise I won't be weird. We'll just forget the whole thing ever happened."

"Yeah, that wouldn't work for me," Dean says.

"Oh."

"It's unfortunate, this thing."

"I know."

"That it happened then."

Sam swallows. His throat has instantly gone dry. "Uh, then? When should it have happened?"

Dean laughs, quietly. "I dunno. It seems like this shouldn't be the thing that's messed me up the most. It's not every day guy loses his memory and then wakes up a serial killing superstar."

"They were possessed by demons," Sam corrects. The unfortunate, _we kill innocent possessed people all the time_ is left unspoken.

"It's just, obviously I'm creeped out. Obviously I'm angry. But mostly, I'm kind of jealous of Dean Smith. Of myself, I guess."

"Oh?" Sam has been reduced to one syllable words.

Dean laughs, mostly to himself. "Yeah, well. I've carried a flame for you like it's the fucking Olympic torch. Then some other guy swoops in and takes advantage? It's a crying shame if you ask me."

Sam's so strung out from months of no sleep and and anxiety he thinks he might give up right then.

"Wanna get out of here?" he says instead.

Dean grins. "Hell yes," he says and they leave.

 

 

 

 

For all the time Sam's imagined fucking Dean, he'd never actually expected it to happen. Obviously.

But if it ever were going to happen, he thinks, as he drives Dean back to the motel room, it makes sense that it would happen now— Sam feeling this sorry for himself, pathetic and mean, and Dean justifiably pissed at him.

Or they might just be going back to pack up their stuff and leave town in their rearview, never to speak of this lapse again. Sam would honestly be happy with either.

The question is answered in the car. A minute on the road and Sam feels a hand land heavily on his knee. He can feel Dean's eyes on him, watching him as he exhales on a shaky breath and keeps driving. He doesn't look Dean's way. If he did, he doesn't know what would happen.

Sam knows he should walk away the minute they park, before they mess things up even more. In fact, Dean should have left Sam in the motel the first time without so much as a note, shirt stained with blood. But instead— this. Sam can't leave for a hundred reasons, and he so badly wants to see how things will turn out.

Silence falls around them as Dean closes the motel room door and removes his disguise. Sam tries to say something, but stops. He licks his lips and Dean follows the motion with his eyes.

"Sam," Dean says.

"Yeah?"

Dean presses a hand to the center of Sam's chest and pushes.

Sam steps back, allowing himself to be maneuvered up against the door, heart rate picking up. A quick, violent jerk off against a wall would be fitting. A good hard surface, nothing romantic about it. Nothing _weird_. You don't just have some pseudo romantic moment with your brother— you do it dirty. The deed should reflect the crime. 

So it should be horrific, Dean breathing harshly into his mouth with the memory now of what they've done and what the have yet to do. It should be terrible.

But the mingling of their breath is intimate in the low evening light coming through the thick curtains, and Sam finds the curve of Dean's shoulders, the way his t-shirt pulls and the soft sound of fabric falling to the floor, almost sweet when Dean yanks off his jacket.

They don't kiss. Again, that would be too much. Instead they stand chest to chest, Sam's hands going to Dean's waist to pull him in against him, to feel him close, wondering that he's allowed to take these liberties. Dean runs his hands up Sam's arms, then turns them around, and Sam allows himself to be tripped into bed, where Sam ends up with the cool sheets against his flushed back where his shirt's shoved up. 

It's dizzying. When he opens his eyes again, Dean is still there, crouched over him with his knees sunk in around Sam's hips, looking like everything Sam's ever dreamed of. But this is not a dream. Thank goodness for small miracles.

Elbows sinking into the mattress under him, able to feel Dean through his jeans, Sam realizes that in his horror over what he had done to Dean, he'd forgotten how much he wanted it. He's embarrassed by it now, as Dean dips his head and seems to take extra pleasure in leaving teeth marks in Sam's neck. Sam's hands fist the bedsheets because actively pulling Dean down against him would mean something he still can't quite admit

Dean's face is scratchy against Sam's neck, and it sends a shiver down to Sam's toes. 

Dean pulls back, one hand sunk in the mattress on either side of Sam's head and a rueful smile on his face. "You just going to lie there, princess, or—"

Sam's restraint ends there. Sam flips their positions and attacks Dean's mouth, to hell with the consequences. He works Dean's mouth open, raking his fingers up under Dean's shirt and feeling the response in every part of Dean he's touching.

Yeah, this whole thing sounds like a joke in Sam's head, it should be hilarious. But Sam is so gone for it. He always thought, when he'd let himself imagine it, that Dean would try to pull some sexy moves and that Sam would laugh at him. A lot. But Sam had somehow forgotten the hot factor, was probably protecting himself. The way Dean tries so hard to keep quiet, and the way Dean doesn't rips his jeans open like a caveman, takes no survivors, but like some sort of goddamned gentleman, popping the button and gently working down the zipper— it's too much. Sam moans against his mouth and tries to urge Dean along, becoming pliant against him.

"Please, come on," he says, shifting his hips closer to Dean's gentle hand. "Dean."

Sam whimpers when Dean touches him, and keeps his eyes squeezed shut while Dean fists his dick in rough pulls. It's not objectively the best handjob he's ever gotten, but what they lack due to awkwardness, Sam deliriously thinks maybe they have a lifetime to make up for.

Sam sits back on his heels for a second and tugs on Dean's jeans until they're around his ankles, then settles back over him. Licking his way into Dean's mouth, he touches him reverently, surprised at the weight of Dean's dick, feeling it slick up in his hand.

Abruptly, Dean's hand leaves him.

Sam lets out a breath, pressing his face into the side of Dean's, squeezing him sadly.

"If we're going to keep doing this," Dean says. "What do you say we step it up a notch."

It shuts Sam up, he goes up on an elbow to look him in the face. Dean's is pink, but he waits calmly as Sam works through what to say.

"I mean, um," Sam says. "Yes. I don't have any…you know...lube."

"I don't either. I have one condom."

Where the others went, Sam doesn't want to think about right now. He falls to his side, and slides his hand over Dean's ass, looking down between them and enjoying the sight of Dean fully turned on.

"Hey, eyes up here," Dean snaps and Sam kisses him again, lingering.

"Ok," Sam says against his lips. "I've always used lube but I'm fine with doing it dry if you are." 

"Ok," Dean agreess, his breath coming out weird. "You know Sam, if I'd of know you'd be so easy..."

Sam drags Dean on top of him, encouraging Dean to rut against his hip, and Dean follows enthusiastically. He can imagine Dean riding him, finally fullfilling that cowboy fantasy Sam has always secretly shared, and he groans slide back over Dean's ass, fingers move to the cleft and closer to their target.

Dean abruptly stops getting off on his leg. The mood shifts noticeably and Sam freezes, like he's been caught red-handed.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Sam jerks his hand away. "Sorry, I thought you— I'm sorry."

The room is almost completely dark now, night having fallen. Dean sits up, a pillow falling off the bed as he leans over to turn on the bedside light. Dean looks a little affronted. "Who says you're the one putting your dick in someone?" 

Sam props himself up on his elbows, frowning back. "You asked if I'd be fine going in dry."

Dean colors. "No, I asked if you were fine getting it dry," he starts.

"Ok, you obviously need to be a little more clear about things." Sam briefly imagines the way it would go for a second before mentally backtracking. "It's just—"

"No, let me guess," says Dean. "You're somehow opposed to—"

"—no," Sam corrects him. It is a point he definitely needs to make at this junction. "I am very, _very_ much ok with that. It's just, without lube— I don't think it would work. Your dick is really, really..." he trails off. 

A grin breaks over Dean's face. "Aw, Sammy. Are you telling me you can't handle my giant dong?"

"Ugh," says Sam, and throws a pillow at him, which Dean catches. Sam rolls to get out of bed, but Dean reaches out to grab his shoulder. Sam jerks away, meaning his elbow slams into the nightstand, right in the funny bone. "Shit."

Dean grabs for his elbow, and Sam lets him. 

"You know, this is actually really flattering," says Dean, massaging Sam's elbow until Sam stops wincing. 

"Let's just drop it," Sam says, but with little heat.

"I'm not sure the topic was adequately covered," Dean says. "I've still got some questions —"

"No comment."

Dean moves his hand to rub up Sam's back. "Ok, let's try that later then."

"Fine," Sam agrees.

"Now," Dean says. "Please get your giant hand on my giant dick."

Sam smiles to himself, and makes Dean wait a long second before tackling him to the matress. "Don't have to tell me, twice," he says, and Dean laughs, sort of wildly, and it turns into a kiss, and quickly into a moan.

Sam reaches between them and takes them both in hand.

"I fucking love you," Sam tells him.

Dean's face screws up like he's been punched. "Prove it, you asshole." He hooks a leg around Sam's and rolls them over. Sam knows that move but it still catches him off guard. 

The movement of Sam's hand is steady, out of sync with his forced breathing. He tries to keep his eyes on Dean's face. He watches Dean fall apart and thinks he knows exactly what it will feel like when he has Dean's dick inside him. He can't wait

And after it happens, Dean rolls off of him and throws an arm across his face. "Oh sweet Jesus."

Sam is only able to manage a smile in agreement. He is borderline uncomfortable with the weird, fucked up way their bodies apparently fit perfectly like pieces of the same broken puzzle.

"That everything you've been waiting for?" he asks, when he's gotten his breath back.

"Shut up," Dean says, blushing horribly again. It's sweet. Time was, Sam would have died of embarrassment to ever think of something his brother did as sweet, but there you have it.

Soon after, Dean's chest begins to rise and fall with sleep. Sam looks down at him for a long time, thinking this is the sort of fucked up situation that only true love and courage can save them from. Luckily, Sam thinks they might have both.

But indulgent self-analysis and reflection never does a body good. Sometimes you simply tell your brother you love him, Sam thinks, somewhere along the long and troubled road. He watches Dean sleeping in the bed next to him like he's seen him sleep a thousand times before. 

"Well godddamn," Sam says with a sense of real wonder. Sometimes, the fast lane hits a fork.

Dean snores next to him in agreement, so low Sam would have to put his face on the pillow next to him to hear it at all. Allowing himself a small smile, Sam steals one of the pillows and shoves his face into it with all intention to pass out until tomorrow.

But then jerks back immediately when he realizes he's lying in the wet spot.

 

 

 

 

The next morning, bright and early, Sam considers making the call. But he also considers picking up and leaving without a backward glance.

In the end, he decides to do the decent thing, and calls Ray.

"Hey you, where you been?" Ray's voice is warm and familiar and causes something like nostalgia to stir in Sam's chest. But he might as well be a million miles away. Without making a conscious choice, Sam has already left this chapter of his life behind.

"Ray, I need to tell you something," Sam starts.

Ray laughs. "Don't worry about it, Sam. I get it."

"Get it?"

"Yeah. Famous actor comes and sweeps your sort-of-boyfriend off his feet? It's kind of hard to compete with that."

"It's not like that," Sam says after a beat.

"What is it like then?"

"No," says Sam. "It's really not that. He's my brother."

Ray's silent for a long time. "Of all the ways to be broken up with...this one is the most unique."

"Yeah, it really takes the cake, doesn't it?"

"Well, it's been real," Ray says.

"It really has." Sam pauses. "Ray. Thank you."

"No worries. See you around, Sam."

Sam listens long after he hears the beep of the call disconnecting. It's unfortunate. But he's had his normal life. Now he's ready to get back on the road.

"Shit, Sam, take a look at this!"

He locks the motel door and turns to see that Dean is leaning against the stolen car, bright in the morning light. He holds out a newspaper and Sam goes to him.

"A case already?" he asks, taking the paper and climbing into the passenger seat while Dean slides in behind the wheel.

"Not exactly."

"What the—" Sam unfolds the paper completely and stares as Dean guns it out of the parking lot. Sam's head hits the low roof of the car, but he barely notices the sting in favor of reading.

On the front page are two articles of interest. The first reads, _Eye-Gouging Killer Still at Large: Last Victim found at Shipping Yard in Detroit_. Sam skims it, but that one is solved.

But the second article, below the fold, features a picture of he and Dean over dinner just a week ago at Alexander's, and reads _Reason for Alec Baldwin's Heartbreak? Or Couple of the Century? Stay tuned._

"'Dean Smith finds love at a local bookstore,'" Sam reads out loud. "'Is it a doomed tale of starcrossed lovers, or a real life prince and the pauper-style fairytale? Only time will tell.'" He drops the paper into his lap and looks to Dean. "What the everloving fuck?"

Dean who Sam realizes has been trying to contain his laughter, let's it out loud. He laughs so long he has tears in his eyes, and Sam can't hold back his own smile.

"How the hell are we going to get out of this one?" he says.

"Only time will tell," says Dean ominously.

Sam tosses the paper in the back seat and looks out the window as Dean drives them out of town.


End file.
